This was supposed to be "just a doodle".... nothing just or doodle about it anymore. I guess, sometimes you need to follow where your creativity is going.

Either way, I present you with a glimpse of Kyu before she was Kyu.

At the time the story takes place, she's lost her memories and has about lost hope of ever regaining them. (Aaaaaand, she won't, that hard drive is wiped clean.) Sometimes there are glimpses, images, but at best they're like déjà vu, nothing tangible and lacking all sorts of context.
While trying on some fancier clothes for a festival there is a short moment of familiarity, but it goes as quickly as it appeared.

(Also, I'm jealous of that hair volume xD)


#originalcharacter #illustration #digitalart #painting #drawing #kyu #oc #femaleoc #oclore #fullbody

Here's a new render of my OC Gwendolyn for 2026 reference. I have designed Gwendolyn back in early 2023. #oc #ocart #originalcharacter #osmanyildiz01 #gwendolyn #magician #girl #femaleoc #ocreference #digitalart #digitaldrawing

The Oncoming Storm

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I love painting Kyu and the ocean. They are very closely linked in my current story WIP, so it feels natural.

Kyu is an amnesiac, who washed ashore close to a port city. In order to find her place in the world and her roots, she travels a lot. But there is always a part of her that is especially drawn to the ocean, as she knows the mystery of her identity lies beyond it.

In this particular piece, there's also a storm approaching from the ocean. I wanted a bit more tension and foreboding in this painting.

I talk about this a lot more in my latest youtube video, in which I show my entire painting process and talk about what thoughts went into this piece at different stages of creating it: youtu.be/oaiPYxP7_vU

#storyWIP #myart #Kyu #Recentia #storm #shore #coast #seascape #water #femaleoc #originalcharacter #oc #digitalart #painting #characterart #landscape #sea #youtube #video #process

Some years ago, while still working on Soul's Journey and having Kyu's story already on the backburner, I had another story idea cooking at the back of my brain. It came while I was musing about taking part in NaNoWriMo and I quite liked it.

The story went as follows:

"Elisabeth Crawford is a con artist, her goal is to find dirt on her victims to in term blackmail them. However, she's just one link in a chain of an organisation operating throughout the country. She's good at what she does, until she met one particular young man. The only target she let go.

And two years after she left him without a word, they meet again. The organisation shows renewed interest and Elisabeth is between a rock and a hard place."

I'm still fond of the idea and will quite likely revisit it. However, before I do so, I should probably practise writing some romance first, cause that's where this fell apart for me before, lol

#digitalart #dancing #originalcharacters #oc #characterillustration #femaleoc #storyidea

For the longest time, I couldn't quite fathom how to draw chibis. Whenever I did, they looked *really* odd.

But then I found the holy grail of chibi drawing: BEANS. BEANS ARE HERE TO DELIVER US!

So, the torsos are beans. That left some stylistics choices to make regarding limbs - thin or thicc, short or long - and the heads/faces. For the eyes I dug deep in my treasure chest of art styles and pulled out some Arina Tanemura, gosh, I love how she draws eyes!

I'll need to draw a couple dozen more chibis to really solidify my process, but the Recentia cast were willing guinea pigs for the first round! (They'll inevitably end up in the coming rounds, too... so yeah).

#ocs #kyu #ayira #wallace #jonathan #characterillustration #characterart #femaleoc #recentia #magic

While I was on vacation, I ordered a new sketchbook. It is a pretty sketchbook. And it arrived just a couple of days after I returned, so the timing I went for worked out nicely!
And then I felt intimidated by the sketchbook.
Well, I finally tackled it. If that first page is out of the way, it can only get better. Right?
Now the bar for this sketchbook is set high.... this is going to be a lot of fun, lol!
I decided on a stained glass aesthetic for the first page, featuring Kyu and Ayira in their respective windows. Both searching for their place in the world, as neither got what they expected.


Kyu's memory was wiped clean and it's looking less likely by the day that she'll ever recover the person she once was, so she has to find out who she is now and how that reflects on what she is or isn't doing.

Meanwhile, Ayira grew up in the shadow of expectations she can't meet anymore, since the powers she was supposed to inherit went to Kyu. Who is she outside the responsibilities she thought she'd have?

And frankly, I find myself in a similar situation. Less fate-of-the-world-on-my-shoulders, but similar in that I'm not quite sure where I'm going anymore.

I've been lacking a long-term goal for myself and my art ever since I finished Soul's Journey. And I think that shows in what I've been doing since. I've meandered a lot. I grew as an artist, which is good. I can now more comfortably solve artistic problems. But where I am going with everything, I'm not sure.
For now, I'm glad I found the cause of my discontent, it gives me something to work with. The solution won't come over night, that I know, but I can feel my way there :)
This illustration got unexpectedly deep for me.

There's also a process video on youtube: https://youtu.be/FfjG3asYuJY

#Kyu #characterart #characterillustration #oc #femaleoc #Ayira #alcoholmarkers #sketchbook

Well, somebody got on her bad side :D



Had a sudden urge to draw Kyu, so she got drawn. I don't argue with her, she's the boss!

#Kyu #characterart #characterillustration #magic #guardian #oc #femaleoc #recentia