My name's Chayos, pronounced like chaos. I'm 24, my pronouns are they/it. My main blog is @sage3m5 and I've got a bunch of other side blogs you can find on your own :]
I post my art and oc stuff here. I also do fanart, very rarely.
Here's my Ko-fi, my commissions are OPEN!
I also stream on Twitch! at cfrog_art with no particular schedule
Asks and requests are ENCOURAGED (IF they're about my ocs) Fanart of my ocs is ALSO allowed, just follow my permissions please <3
full taglist under the cut 👍
Tags for filtering
These are things that show up regularly that I tag so you can filter them out, please let me know if there's anything else that needs tagging!
i bought the tiniest toy squeakers i could find and they are STILL too big to fit inside of my little clown plushies. SAD. ill find other things to put them in :P
I've decided to crochet a few more clowns and other plushies this month (which i sell on my ko-fi btw). And since This Month is June... I might as well make them pride themed, right?
Already working on a trans flag one, but is there any other flags or identities or queer-related themes folks would like to see? :3c
This is technically in celebration of hitting 200 followers on Unvale, but cause I love YOU, my dear tumblr followers, too, you also get to participate. Here's how it works:
Send me an ask about my ocs. It can be a lore question, a design question, a writing question, a question about my oc process in general, a question directed AT an oc, anything that comes to mind!
For every question asked, in return, I'll doodle one of your ocs! Expect something like these, maybe a little less clean, we'll see how busy i get ^^" If there's a specific character you'd like drawn, feel free to include that in your ask :] otherwise i will travel to your blog and hunt one down myself.
For some questions, I might answer with art, too, like if I wanna draw a comic in response. consider that a bonus, that won't count as ur doodle.
This offer will go until I get overwhelmed or bored, BUT REMEMBER: questions and interactions are always welcome in my ask box! This is just the only time I'll bribe you for it :P
Discussions are underway with Echo about possibly depicting him as a mii on my tomodachi island. A compromise has yet to be reached, and possibly never will. It feels like this rn.
The first set of doodles all together, and all the questions I got from Unvale :]
A simple question with a long answer cause of Grey's complicated complicated death.
In life, Grey was a being called a Chroma, which is about as close the setting gets to an angel or deity. They're powerful and immortal, made of almost pure magic. The only way for them to die is if a being of equal power performs a special spell, a process so catastrophically painful it turns them into a special type of ghost, called a Shade. Anne (Grey's name when she was alive) was specifically taken down by Azzy, a Shade who knew her in life. He haunted, manipulated, and finally killed Anne to get revenge on her mother, the one who killed him. Long string of immortal family murder drama that ended with Grey dying badly :(
Rest below the cut!
Color association has always been just a thing my brain does >< for older ocs, it was specifically a personality thing (The Sages being the extremes of that), but I've lessened the specifics on it as years go on. Like after I learned Color Theory and stuff. Now I don't really have a specific process! One newer example tho, the cowboys, i specifically designed their colors based off trees (obvs) but also seasons!
Moe: "Uhm... I guess the one that stuck with me the most was, one time I pulled a bat out of my pocket. Like a live bat, like the animal! I don't even know how that got in there..."
Ollie: "I've tried one before. Moe suggested it to me. It was very sugary, but I liked it."
Blue: "OOOO VOCALOID!! jeez that's tough to pick tho.... I'll say ONE of my faves rite NOW is LOVELY♥CAVITY from sawtowne ^u^ so sweet and cute!!!"
Thank youuuu ^w^ A favorite of The Sages??? Why, I could never- (covers all of their ears) Okay, so my answer to that does change all the time, I go through phases with each of them, but I'd say right now, probably Grey. She came out very accurate on my Tomodachi Life LTD island, and i feel very endeared to her putting her in cute outfits and feeding her snacks. And because I love insulting them, Red and Yellow are usually my least favorites. They have their moments, but someone has to be at the bottom of the list.
And favorite colors is easy: it's the colors that they are! Except Grey, her favorite color is pink. Canonically, in Sage's universe, your favorite color is like… ingrained in your soul. Ordained by fate. See my answer to FazDude's questions, color association used to be VERY important to me lol
yayy yippeee so many questions for meee :3
◦ Is Moe immortal? 🤔 what a good question... I'm being cheeky about it cause that's a plot point in LEDDlabs ^^ They've lived through all sorts of crazy stuff, and while they do pop back to normal pretty fast, it still hurts! The only scars for Moe are mental ones 👍
◦ From a dream, actually! Had a dream about a band of cowboys traveling through a strange abandoned modern landscape. They're almost one-to-one from the dream, though the original dream had two extra characters (traveling scholars they incidentally kidnapped) and some magic/fantasy elements. I might still include those at some point! I haven't decided.
◦ Heir doesn't know what a crown is! Merfolk aren't much for head accessories on account of they are underwater and sometimes upside down. Heir found their crown in a shipwreck, found it fit on their head well enough, and have kept wearing it like that ever since, despite Lord's annoyance.
◦ Archie's favorite food is sweet berries :3 just one berry is enough of a meal for them...
◦ The Dark is a lot of things. The Dark is there because LEDD is there. The Dark is surprisingly good at dancing, they're very physically coordinated. Dr. Ihop was originally in The Dark to hide from LEDD, but now he's hiding from a lot of things... like The Dark!
◦ And Astaroth <3 she's a LEDDlabs og, from back when it was a homebrew D&D campaign. I had to come up with a lot of strange puzzles and "possessed doll with a very complicated bedtime ritual" is just one that stuck LOL. The name Astaroth was the first demon name i found without much existing characterization or lore, so I was free to do whatever with him.
Another og LEDDlabs character that didn't stick was Macken Cheese the capybara. He was a chef.
I'm starting to slow down on these so i might only do One More Page. So tumblr folks if you have questions.... [Send asks, get art]
More unvale questions and answers under the cut 👍
My oc designs come from all sorts of places! Though a weirdly high amount come from dreams 🤔 Other than those visions from my subconscious, I usually only design characters with some goal in mind, so my designing process is mostly sketching and note-taking until it matches what I need, lots of trial and error. There's plenty of googling too (looking up types of clothes, reading entire wikipedia articles, sometimes I like to find a photo or something to pull a color palette from). The only times I put together a proper moodboard is when the character is mostly done. I find it helps me unify a design and wrap everything together. If a character has too many ideas to be conveyed in a little collage (or too few!), then I know it needs some tweaking.
◦ Maybe this is a vague one but I love funky eye designs :3c from realistic stuff (heterochromia, lazy eyes, missing an eye) to animal-based eyes (differ pupil shapes, multiple eyelids) and even totally fantastical stuff. The eyes are one of the most important parts of a design, and it's fun to make them unique and identifiable!
◦ Only one? 🥺 but they'd be so lonely... okayy I guess Logically I should keep LEDD, seeing as he's one of my more popular guys, and he's such a cutiepie too. And with how complicated his lore is, I could probably get by with drawing only him.
◦ That's an easy one, it's Sage! My first ever oc. The oldest dated drawing I have of Sage is from 2014, but she existed more nebulously as a rp character before even that. I'm already making plans for her "sweet 16th birthday" in a few years.
◦ And this is the tough one. I'm really not much of a fandom person these days! If I just picked a character that I'd like to draw, that'd be kinda boring, seeing as I could make fanart anytime anyways... I'll pick Kris from Deltarune. Toby can have them until he's finished with his game, but then they're mine. I'll make a little certificate of Kris ownership and hang it on a wall and do nothing else with them. So they can rest after their big adventure.
Hii :] I had to really think about one cause like ^^' I've got so many, and they're all inspired by different stuff!! So I guess I'll answer what first got me started on making ocs?
When I was a kid, I really wanted to be an author, cause I love telling stories and exploring characters. But I learned pretty quickly that I HATE writing prose u.u I was ready to just quit writing altogether, but a friend of mine introduced me to some online communities, like DeviantArt, and introduced me to concept of ocs! Before that, I thought the only way to make a character was to write a whole book about them, but it turns out there's wayyy more options for sharing stories with people :]
Webcomics especially have always been a big inspiration for me. With comics, the only actual writing you have to do is dialogue :P
which oc or ocs is/are the most Deranged? just the most utterly unhinged. most freak on main. (if those are different criteria you can answer with different ocs for each, or not)
Fantastic question, I have so many to choose from. Xiph is a pretty obvious one, they're definitely the freakiest robot, and not (just) in the horny way. They're violent and strange <3 I guess mostly focusing on the term "unhinged" (unstable, unpredictable, detached from the concept normal behavior), I could sort Heir and Anuran as freaks as well. Though Heir's behavior is more of a cultural differences thing and Anuran's is very intentional. My collection of freaky they/thems.
For sure, though, the title of Most Deranged has to go to Sage. Even if you don't count the sages (five freaks in one freak, she's cheating), she stands strong on her own. The girl was designed after creepypastas, she's SO unhinged. She loves murder, she loves manipulation, she'll laugh and joke while tormenting a target like a cat with a mouse. She's scurrying around on the walls like a dracula. What are you gonna do about it, arrest her? Kill her? Too late, she's a ghost. Sage is completely free from the expectations of normality, none of that shit matters anymore and she is taking advantage of it! Death will do that to you sometimes 🤷
Here's art of one of your freaks 👍 Thanks for the ask :]
[Send asks, get art]
(not entirely relevant but i added "freak" to my island lingo recently, so heres some bonus tomodachi screenshots)
This is technically in celebration of hitting 200 followers on Unvale, but cause I love YOU, my dear tumblr followers, too, you also get to participate. Here's how it works:
Send me an ask about my ocs. It can be a lore question, a design question, a writing question, a question about my oc process in general, a question directed AT an oc, anything that comes to mind!
For every question asked, in return, I'll doodle one of your ocs! Expect something like these, maybe a little less clean, we'll see how busy i get ^^" If there's a specific character you'd like drawn, feel free to include that in your ask :] otherwise i will travel to your blog and hunt one down myself.
For some questions, I might answer with art, too, like if I wanna draw a comic in response. consider that a bonus, that won't count as ur doodle.
This offer will go until I get overwhelmed or bored, BUT REMEMBER: questions and interactions are always welcome in my ask box! This is just the only time I'll bribe you for it :P
Okay. CFROG Art Tips for real this time. Mostly about digital coloring and layer modes.
Divide Layers: If you want to use colors from a photo of traditional art, but want the colors to look less muddy, use divide layers! Add a layer over top with the color of the paper and set the blending mode to Divide. This will balance out the lighting of the image and give you a better idea of the "real colors" of the piece. Taking your photos in direct sunlight can also help with this.
I use this all the time for art trades and Art Fight, if a character only has traditional art for reference.
more under cut :P im just listing em all
Blend Modes: Just about every digital art software has "blend modes" or a similar feature. There's specific equations behind each option and what they do, but unless you're a mathematician, those explanations probably won't stick. Just take the time to experiment with them thoroughly! Avoid thinking of them simply "shading" or "highlights". Personally, I hate using Overlay layers for highlighting (it looks too plastic-y!) and love using Hard Light layers for shading (it's extra saturated, reminds me of layering markers!). Find what looks best to you!
I didn't draw a thing for it but Lighten can be great for coloring lineart, even if its on the same layer as your colors. As long as you're not making it lighter than the colors, i suppose.
Shading: Don't stress out about learning to shade, it's a lot less of a science than it looks. Start by using small slivers of a darker color to denote a section as being under or behind another. The area under a character's chin is the most obvious, but also try shading the leg farthest from the viewer or where the arm overlaps with the body. Even small amounts of shading can add so much clarity to a design! You can work your way up from there.
Generally, shadows get bigger, lighter, and more displaced the farther apart the two surfaces are.
Super basic shading: Use the base colors for each section of color and a multiply layer. I like to shade with a bright contrasting color to see where I'm drawing first, then copying the base colors on top. This is great for if you're just drawing a character standing in a void and don't care about environmental shading. It just makes it darker and more saturated. Better than shading with black.
Pure white/black: You heard about not using pure white or black in your art, but how do you decide what colors to use instead? It depends on how you want the white or black to look! For example, if I want this character's white shirt to blend together with the rest of her outfit, since it's so red heavy, I'd use a very light pink. This gives the fabric a softer look. If I want to white to look more like a bright, clean white, I'd use a very light blue, somewhere on the opposite side of the colorwheel. The hue will contrast against the red to look even more white than plain white!
Note that even the grays in her design are slightly red, so the blue shirt is clearly a different material than her skin. Using even slightly different hues can help with clarity like that. I also kept the pure white on her eyes, cause rules are made to be broken :P
Changing the white and black values on a design can also change the look of the colors around it. Other than the lineart, the three headshots at the bottom use all the same colors. This is great for lighting and matching a character to an environment.
(note: i used lighten and darken layers to change just the lineart :0 wow just like i mentioned earlier)
How do I make the colors look nice together??: Unify your color palette by adding a blending layer of a single color over everything. The exact layer mode isn't important, again, experiment. But overlay is usually good if you like them bright.
I also like to use overlay layers for adding textures and extra lighting on top of my images. That's how I do the stock photos on my oc CanCan, it adds a fun collage or screentone vibe. If you have a character on a background who looks out of place: you can copy the background, blur it, clip it over top the character, and set it to overlay (or a different mode, it depends) to help unify the character's colors with the background's.
If you have further questions, I will do my best to answer 👍 i hope this makes sense.
The first set of doodles all together, and all the questions I got from Unvale :]
A simple question with a long answer cause of Grey's complicated complicated death.
In life, Grey was a being called a Chroma, which is about as close the setting gets to an angel or deity. They're powerful and immortal, made of almost pure magic. The only way for them to die is if a being of equal power performs a special spell, a process so catastrophically painful it turns them into a special type of ghost, called a Shade. Anne (Grey's name when she was alive) was specifically taken down by Azzy, a Shade who knew her in life. He haunted, manipulated, and finally killed Anne to get revenge on her mother, the one who killed him. Long string of immortal family murder drama that ended with Grey dying badly :(
Rest below the cut!
Color association has always been just a thing my brain does >< for older ocs, it was specifically a personality thing (The Sages being the extremes of that), but I've lessened the specifics on it as years go on. Like after I learned Color Theory and stuff. Now I don't really have a specific process! One newer example tho, the cowboys, i specifically designed their colors based off trees (obvs) but also seasons!
Moe: "Uhm... I guess the one that stuck with me the most was, one time I pulled a bat out of my pocket. Like a live bat, like the animal! I don't even know how that got in there..."
Ollie: "I've tried one before. Moe suggested it to me. It was very sugary, but I liked it."
Blue: "OOOO VOCALOID!! jeez that's tough to pick tho.... I'll say ONE of my faves rite NOW is LOVELY♥CAVITY from sawtowne ^u^ so sweet and cute!!!"
Thank youuuu ^w^ A favorite of The Sages??? Why, I could never- (covers all of their ears) Okay, so my answer to that does change all the time, I go through phases with each of them, but I'd say right now, probably Grey. She came out very accurate on my Tomodachi Life LTD island, and i feel very endeared to her putting her in cute outfits and feeding her snacks. And because I love insulting them, Red and Yellow are usually my least favorites. They have their moments, but someone has to be at the bottom of the list.
And favorite colors is easy: it's the colors that they are! Except Grey, her favorite color is pink. Canonically, in Sage's universe, your favorite color is like… ingrained in your soul. Ordained by fate. See my answer to FazDude's questions, color association used to be VERY important to me lol
yayy yippeee so many questions for meee :3
◦ Is Moe immortal? 🤔 what a good question... I'm being cheeky about it cause that's a plot point in LEDDlabs ^^ They've lived through all sorts of crazy stuff, and while they do pop back to normal pretty fast, it still hurts! The only scars for Moe are mental ones 👍
◦ From a dream, actually! Had a dream about a band of cowboys traveling through a strange abandoned modern landscape. They're almost one-to-one from the dream, though the original dream had two extra characters (traveling scholars they incidentally kidnapped) and some magic/fantasy elements. I might still include those at some point! I haven't decided.
◦ Heir doesn't know what a crown is! Merfolk aren't much for head accessories on account of they are underwater and sometimes upside down. Heir found their crown in a shipwreck, found it fit on their head well enough, and have kept wearing it like that ever since, despite Lord's annoyance.
◦ Archie's favorite food is sweet berries :3 just one berry is enough of a meal for them...
◦ The Dark is a lot of things. The Dark is there because LEDD is there. The Dark is surprisingly good at dancing, they're very physically coordinated. Dr. Ihop was originally in The Dark to hide from LEDD, but now he's hiding from a lot of things... like The Dark!
◦ And Astaroth <3 she's a LEDDlabs og, from back when it was a homebrew D&D campaign. I had to come up with a lot of strange puzzles and "possessed doll with a very complicated bedtime ritual" is just one that stuck LOL. The name Astaroth was the first demon name i found without much existing characterization or lore, so I was free to do whatever with him.
Another og LEDDlabs character that didn't stick was Macken Cheese the capybara. He was a chef.
Do any of your OC's have some insane character dynamics with each other, or are they mildly chaotic?
Oooo, so many to choose from 🤔 I do love a wild character dynamic, tho im not sure I'm always the best at coming up with 'em :P
I've been writing some interactions between my minecraft ocs Heir and Lord again lately, they have a real enemies-to-"enemies" thing going on. Heir is a violent "lawful good" merfolk, Lord is a fire-demon vampire who likes pissing people off, their relationship started with repeated murders (Heir kicking Lord's ass).
At some point, Heir starts putting up with them (cause respawning means killing Lord is kinda pointless) and even starts caring about them 🥺 but they both suck at direct communication, so they don't realize neither of them actually want to be enemies anymore 🤷 Just carrying out the motions of how they started out... and sometimes between fights they kiss :3c
These are the type of things id love to add to artfight's new character link things, but i do not have the patience to go thru and write them all outtt 😔
