Lady Scarlet is, for lack of a better way to describe it, essentially a vampire. Her eyes are typically the blue eyes that we’re used to, but when she gets hungrier, her eyes turn red and expressionless. To balance out the expression lost in her eyes, I have her ACT with more expression, putting more expression into her body language and voice.
With her eyes typically being a more expressive blue, I feel it shows a loss of self when they just seem to be emotionless and blank.
That makes more sense. Dead eyes in anime are established as a visual way of showing when someone isn’t themself. Still looks strange in a pose like that though. If you’re going for expressionless, though, you nailed it. It looks complete unnatural, as it would when someone has no expression whatsoever.
That’s pretty cool actually. Damn near copies of each other O.o
That being said, i’ve never heard of this game or character, nor have I seen her before.
I can promise you, I have no intent on stealing characters or appearances. I am changing Willow’s appearance, but not because it’s “stolen”, but because I want to change the look.
Still, small pieces of heavy armor over a light leather base is still what i’m going for. Armored, yet light, something fitting of a wind mage.
I appreciate you bringing this to my attention. But do not assume my intentions are to steal the work of others. That’s dishonorable, and as you said, not befitting of a hero.
Am I missing something? Because the only things I see are copies of each other are the brown gloves and the blue cloth wrapped around their chests. It looks like to me that Ravness has blond, braided hair while Willow has brown hair tied into a long ponytail that almost reaches her knees. Ravness wears black and white shorts with a frilly edge while Willow wears plain black tights. Ravness has light yellowish boots that look more armored and knightlike that go far past her knees while Willow has brown boots that don’t. Ravness has a naginata while I don’t remember Willow having a weapon at all. I do remember that somebody named Krieger had a lance, but I didn’t see Willow’s weapon. I could be wrong, but I think they only have a slight resemblance at best. While I’m on the topic of similar looking characters, Lady Scarlet kinda reminded me of Cinder.
This was Willow’s weapon:
The spear itself was modeled to look fairly similar to the one that apparently belonged to this character. Keyword here is WAS. It was used as inspiration, which led me to her current weapon:
I may use other people’s work for inspiration, but I don’t steal work.
As for your comment on Lady Scarlet and Cinder Fall, yes, Cinder was an inspiration for her Scarlet. She’s a great villain, with a great look.
To me, Scarlet looks like a mix between Miltia Malachite and Cinder Fall.
Also, Fantastic work!!!
Looking at it, I think you should probably use thicker lines. Also, the shaft of that spear looks thin, easy to break. What is it supposed to be made from? Also, I looked a few pages back and you were talking about it being animated, and hopefully well…will you have the resources for that? Other than the time needed to animate (however long you choose an episode to last), you also need decent voice actors, and music and sound effects. For an example of something that doesn’t have any of these, look up Deadstar The Animated Series. That was made in Blender. Last I saw of it, it had improved a fair amount, but the older ones are just not great at all, to me.
I am not good at modeling weapons, which is why Scarlet doesn’t have one yet.
The resources are tough. There are a good amount of voice actors on youtube looking for stuff like this, people that voice act abridged series and stuff. Music is tricky, just because of royalty laws. Royalty free music isn’t hard to find, it’s just finding mysic that is quality and fits. It also typically costs a fair amount per song. Sound effects follow that same thing.
Well see there’s the problem. Abridged Series are another thing that so many people are trying to do you’ll have a hard time, I suspect, finding people decent. If it’s not their acting quality that’s the problem, it’s probably their sound quality. And the people with both good sound and quality acting might want pay, or some form of reimbursement for the time and effort. Can you do that?
Also, come to think of it, Abridgers are notorious for dropping out or suffering schedule slippage.
Sigh. Alright, i’ll play your game.
“Claims to have never heard or seen this character, but admits they are “damn near” copies of each other.”
I’m…sorry? Can I not do that? Do you want me to scour the entire internet to make sure my characters don’t look like others? What do you want? So I had a concept similar to someone else. Great. Statistically, it’s going to happen eventually.
“decides to change design but repeatedly denies “stealing,” something you have yet to be accused of.”
So i’m not allowed to change designs? Shit, that’s pretty limiting.
Your right, you never said stealing. You just said I was copying her design and to stop. Sounds like an accusation of stealing to me.
You want to mention the similarities but ignore the differences. Leg armor is missing, along with a much different color, leather boots, different shape of the breastplate, completely different arms, the shoulder plates are more of shoulder cups, and not as angular as the other character, the hair is completely different, and did you REALLY point out that the armor is grayish? Really? Tell me, what color is metal?
You’re stretching to make it look like i’m “copying” her design. Stop.
If that’s supposed to be a copy, it’s a poor one. For one, and importantly, Willow lacks a lot of the detail that makes that character’s design unique. A boot is a boot when there’s nothing to distinguish it. Look at the detail on that character’s legs…it’s a lot more elaborate than Willow, who has nothing. Plain tights. Then there’s the bike shorts, which frankly aren’t an uncommon sight at all on female fighting characters. The white at the side and edge does seem to be present in both though, The same lack of detail goes for the chest; considering the weaponry and magic-based setting, I would tend to expect something like that to be laced or stitched, whatever that is. The colours aren’t similar either, unless you think someone has a trademark on blue and grey. And again, look at the detail one the sleeves, and the gloves. Willow’s design doesn’t possess that. As far as I can see the hair is quite different too, though it’s difficult to judge based on the angle of that character’s head. The spear, I’ll grant you, has a very strong resemblance.
Thing is, none of these traits are especially unique. I’ve not seen any outright evidence that Grey Silhouette steals designs, so I’m prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt when the “evidence” is so loose.
Also, seriously? You did all but use the word “steal”. You’re seriously going to have a go at him for admitting the similarities and deciding to change the design? What do you think you’re doing? Trying to have a “gotcha” moment?
Also, one thing I did notice at the end of writing this is that the image you’re referencing as proof? That’s pages old. The design has changed since then, and changed before it. Don’t you think if he was plagiarising he would’ve just magically turned up with that design? The latest one I found was this one:
[ATTACH=CONFIG]423182[/ATTACH]
The neck is different, and the bike shorts are just full tights now. Page 4, a bit above halfway down the page. If you’re to accuse someone of theft, you should see what they developed from and what the most recent version is.
“I know you said some features aren’t unique, but before that, I said these features appear together.”
By your logic, everyone wearing a shirt and pants right now would be plagiarizing the first person to ever wear both a shirt and pants because both shirts and pants aren’t unique individually, but both shirts and pants appear together at the same time.
“the creator maintains he has never seen or heard of the supposed original. This is hard to believe.”
Not everyone in the world is aware of the game Ravness originated from. Before you mentioned it, I had no idea she even existed. And odds are her origins are not some incredibly famous video game like Mario or Pokemon that you can ask some random person on the street if they heard of it before and they say yes. It seems impossible for somebody to be aware of every single obscure creation out there. Kinda like what Gray said, you really can’t expect him/her or anyone to scour hundreds of thousands of obscure video games, films, television shows, books, or any other medium to make sure her creations do not have the slightest resemblance to anything ever produced by a human being before.
“A simple explanation for differing detail is that it takes skill to model intricate armor. Plus, any supposed thief would know to cover their tracks.”
It almost sounds like you’re trying to insult Gray by calling her a thief and saying he/she doesn’t have the talent to create detailed armor.
“I think its called incremental plagiarism. It is a theory, and only that.”
“I have yet to and cannot make an outright accusation”
I’m pretty sure you just did by explicitly saying that what Gray is doing is called incremental plagiarism. Calling it a theory doesn’t make it any less outright. Neither is constantly trying to convince Gray multiple times that he/she has stole a character design.
As for your comment on Lady Scarlet and Cinder Fall, yes, Cinder was an inspiration for her Scarlet. She’s a great villain, with a great look.
I know right? She looks cool and she makes the show more interesting imo. I wasn’t really fond of the whole slice of life thing to be honest and I’m glad there’s conflict now. However, her motivations don’t really seem to extend beyond getting the maidens’ powers and generic anarchy by Grimm. Hopefully we’ll get some more backstory, but not too much portraying her in a sympathetic light because I’m kinda getting sick of the whole “the villain must be redeemed” plot more recent works have started to do.
Gonna try to respond to everyone!
Three:
Look, I get where you’re coming from. My character (concept stage) looks similar to Ravness. Let me make two things very clear:
- I appreciate people like you. You found a character that looks like mine and informed me. I REALLY appreciate that. I want my characters to look unique, so finding characters that look too similar is actually really helpful.
- I do not, however, appreciate what you’re trying to do. You’re trying very hard to convince others that I’m “copying” or soft core plagiarizing someone else’s work. Look, I’ve dealt with people like you before. I don’t know how you expect this to end. Do you want me to stop working on Willow? Or stop work on the project altogether, just because my character looks similar to another? Because let me make this extremely clear, that is not going to happen.
You keep trying to convince everyone that i’m trying to plagiarize work, which is nowhere near correct. You can bring up as many points as you like, but that won’t change the fact that Willow is MY character, and her design is my own. Not only that, but she (and everything else shown so far) is in the CONCEPT stage. Until trailers come out, these characters can change appearance, and even be erased at will. She can look like Ravness now and look completely different tomorrow, and it won’t matter. Because none of it is official yet.
If you continue to harass my thread by accusing me of plagiarizing (which you are), then I will report you to the moderators. I appreciate you bringing Ravness’ appearance to my attention. But that’s all you needed to do. Not this. This is insulting.
Mammal Pod and Omnilord:
I need to really thank you both. You defended me better than I could (to be fair, with a situation like this, basically anything I said is forfeit), so thank you both.
Mr_Jello100:
"To me, Scarlet looks like a mix between Miltia Malachite and Cinder Fall.
Also, Fantastic work!!!"
Had to google who Militia Malachite was 
That red twin; forgot about her. It’s a shame that she was only in the Yellow trailer (I think it was just there), I really liked her fighting style. Thanks!
Mammal Pod:
"Well see there’s the problem. Abridged Series are another thing that so many people are trying to do you’ll have a hard time, I suspect, finding people decent. If it’s not their acting quality that’s the problem, it’s probably their sound quality. And the people with both good sound and quality acting might want pay, or some form of reimbursement for the time and effort. Can you do that?
Also, come to think of it, Abridgers are notorious for dropping out or suffering schedule slippage."
I actually have a few people already in mind to contact (about twenty so far), all of which have good sound quality and voice acting quality. Hopefully I can get some to say yes. If not, then i’ll have to improvise with friends. Yes, I can reimburse them, and even more if i’m able to monetize (which means royalty free music, sigh).
As for dropping out, that’s a risk that is bound to happen with voice actors that aren’t “professionals”. Whether it’s friends or youtubers, it’s always a threat.
Scheduling is probably not going to be a huge issue just because of the amount of time it’d take to make ONE episode. I’m planning on them being at least fifteen minutes which is a LOT of frames and therefore time to make, which gives more wiggle room for time to get the lines that I need.
Omnilord:
“I know right? She looks cool and she makes the show more interesting imo. I wasn’t really fond of the whole slice of life thing to be honest and I’m glad there’s conflict now. However, her motivations don’t really seem to extend beyond getting the maidens’ powers and generic anarchy by Grimm. Hopefully we’ll get some more backstory, but not too much portraying her in a sympathetic light because I’m kinda getting sick of the whole “the villain must be redeemed” plot more recent works have started to do.”
To solve your question of my gender, I am male.
I really like the darker route RWBY has taken (especially the most recent episode, dayum), that slice of life thing wasn’t working for me. I like the episode of backstory (kinda) that we got for Cinder, and I don’t see how they could try to redeem her, except by maybe trying to say that the current fall maiden was evil. Though with what’s going on, it’d be pretty hard to sell her as being more evil than Cinder at the moment.
Season 3 finale on saturday. My body is ready. O.O
Another thing that occurred to me was mouths. I think you said they were drawn on, right? Why would you do that instead of an actual mouth? I suppose it’s easier, but won’t it be clear at a lot of angles that it has no depth? Not sure if you’d be willing to go back and change it at this point, but I’d still suggest, at least for next time you decide to redo things, that they have actual mouths. I believe if it’s done correctly, it can still look about right.
The only one with a drawn on mouth is actually just 217, the others have mouths. My issue with the mouth is more of animating it than anything else, it just seems like a HUGE pain in general.
Alright, so news. First off, Willow progress.
Changes that i’m going for so far are: updated cover pallete from less blue/gray to more of a softer white/blue or maybe white/purple. Hair change. Adding feathers to her armor, and giving her more of a gentler feel and making her appearance more birdlike. I plan on giving her her a cape type thing, that she can extend to look like a set of wings and tail, giving the appearance of a Swallow in flight. Uncertain of her lower body; i’m thinking shorts and a see-though skirt, maybe. Not sure how that’ll go.
Right now I plan on changing her current chest armor to look less like it’s 100% feathers and make it look like feathers on a metal breastplate.
now the important stuff: I’m probably halting progress on Willow for a while. Stopping everyone, really. Why? Well, because I can’t really call myself an animator. I haven’t really… animated anything. The closest i’ve gotten is posing, and that’s nowhere near the same thing. Sooo…
I’m gonna start working on Lady Scarlet’s trailer video. I have a song that I can use (I know I can use it, I don’t know if I can monetize the video. I’m asking the artist.), and a good idea of how I want the trailer to go.
So far I need to make background characters, MAYBE finish Krieger for it (emphasize MAYBE), make environments (like, three. And one is a snowy plain/forest area, so it shouldn’t be a massive pain). I also need to learn how to animate artistically. Every motion, every scene needs to MEAN something. It needs to be nice to look at, but also to have meaning in everything. Positioning, colors, sound, all of it. It needs to make people think about the character, their actions, their intentions, their emotions, but without being obvious.
Yeah, that shouldn’t be too hard.
Good lord, i’m doomed. Let’s do it.
Thanks for looking!
Oh, I see. The post I was referencing never specified if it was anyone individual, and it’s difficult to tell since most shots are from the front. I get mouths are a pain, but I don’t think you can avoid it. 2D mouths are easier, but won’t hold up to much. 3D ones are a lot more of a pain, but I think they’ll probably be a lot more expressive, which’ll be important for showing emotions.
Anyway, Willow’s new hair looks good, but the neck doesn’t look right. That’s probably just because it’s so thin though, which is normal in this style. I think you should be careful with your use of feathers. Overdo it and it’ll not look good. Also, how would feathers be fixed onto a metal breastplate?
Glad to see you’re still making progress. About the drawn on mouth, there is one advantage that has over modeling it in 3D. With a drawn on mouth, you can have a better time doing that thing in anime where they draw the mouth on the side of the face when the camera views them from the side to get a more 2D and anime like feel. It’s not much of an advantage, but it is something to take note of if you go down that route. On the topic of animation, it would help if you look up the 12 Principles of Animation. Those tips are useful for getting the basics down and having a much smoother and nicer result. First video of it is here:
Also, I like the idea of feathers being used as some sort of armor. It’s a bit unusual, but I’m attracted to impractically cool things. It’s mostly the reason why I watch RWBY. Speaking of which, thoughts on the finale? In my opinion, I only kinda liked it, not because of the sudden shift to darkness, but because it took a deus ex machina to make a dent in the villain’s plan, the introduction of plot points that I thought should have been introduced much earlier, and the shocking reveal at the end which I’m not fond of those kinds of twists personally. I mostly blame the slow pacing of the first two volumes for making it feel like what is actually very close to the beginning feel a lot more like the middle of the story, which it would make more sense at the beginning. However, it looks like things will get more interesting as the plot begins to develop and the status quo has permanently changed. I’m interested in seeing where they take things from here as well as the fact that we may get more screentime with Ruby, Nora, and Ren together (Don’t care for Jaune that much :P).
I realise you’re talking to Gray Silhouette and not me, but since what you’re saying is relevant to something I mentioned before I think it’s fine. I’m still not sold on 2D mouths. I think there’s definitely some advantage to it as far as mimicking typical manga and anime styles goes. But I also think what you can do with it is a lot more limited. It would also probably be harder to get a decent-looking lip sync, since you’d need lots of mouth images to match all the sounds, or just to have a few, but that would not match well. On the other hand, the 3D ones can be awkward. The one in the post I have above was odd to do. Matching the kind of shapes typically seen in manga and anime meant it wasn’t much like normal mouths.
As far as RWBY goes, it was sort of a load of crap. I mean, the only thing suggesting she had anything unusual going on was a single line two volumes ago. The tone shift wasn’t so sudden though, if you ask me. A lot of this volume was that way, it just got progressively darker. I like the fact that they don’t seem to be afraid to kill people off. It’s refreshing.
Yeah I agree with a lot of what you said. I can’t really see why anyone would use a 2D modeled mouth over 3D apart from that one particular niche, but I haven’t done a lot of work with mouths yet so my experience is limited there. I still think that 3D mouths are better and easier to model. And on RWBY, you make good points. They’ve been trying to be dark for some time now, especially when it comes to the song lyrics, but I think it was mostly sudden after the Yang and Mercury fight. I must have worded it awkwardly when I meant that it got “suddenly dark in the finale” because I mostly meant “suddenly darker after the tournament fight as compared to the previous 2.5 seasons”. And I don’t mind killing off other characters either. Killing off other characters allows the villains to be established as more of a threat and frees up screen time for the remaining characters so that they can get meaningful character development.
For the mouth, I’m actually probably going to do both. Omnilord had a good point about the side profile mouths that’s typically in anime, and Mammal Pod had a good point about 3D mouths being more expressive. So I’ll do both, depending on what the scene demands.
For the feather armor, I’m not sure. I would assume that they’d be glued/epoxied onto the metal (after roughing it up for more surface area). Either that or go the extra mile and physically drill each feather into the metal, but that seems too over complicated. I don’t want to go the “oh, it’s a MAGIC chest plate so the feathers MAGICALLY stay on” route, because that’s just a cop-out.
Now, onto the topic of that RWBY finale.
Yeah. Happy show, remember?
Deus ex Ruby was… kinda dumb, not a huge fan of that.
Fairly unsatisfied with the reveal of Salem as well, but her voice over was the shit.
I am VERY happy with the mood shift over the course of this season to a darker tone; that was actually my main complaint about the show prior to the change. I like that they aren’t afraid to kill off characters and aren’t afraid to, eh, lend a hand to main characters. The main death of this season was beautifully done, and I applaud them for it. Setting up the main villains as, you know, actual THREATS is something that very few shows do, so A+ for that.
All in all, satisfied with this season. Pumped for season four. Luckily I’m going to RTX this year and you better believe that I’m going to that RWBY panel