You guys know my Sonic OC, Mira, right? Well, I made a video about her a while ago and while I am happy how she came out, I still feel like I can do more for her. I want her to blend in as a Sonic character, but I don’t know how to do it. Thankfully, fellow tumblr artist, @astrophysician, is not only a Sonic fan, but a very skilled character designer. I find them so smart about designing characters that I asked them about MIra, even asking them for some criticism, and thankfully they responded and gave me the criticism I need to make my OC more Sonic-like. Here’s everything they said:
“ The inspiration from Silver is clear in the cuffs and soles. Given that she’s from Silver’s time and knows him. It’s likely that she might have found similar technology to his, so that’s fine. However, I would encourage you to consider giving Mira her own look anyway. Sonic characters are each very distinct like that. I want to see technology/accessories made specifically for Mira, because it would tell me a lot about who she is and what she can do! ”
I didn’t know how I should give Mira her own design as a girl from the future, especially since designing futuristic clothes is still a bit of a learning curve for me. That is until I thought of Baymax from Big Hero 6.
You know how Baymax’s eyes are just two dots connected with a line? Well that’s where I got the idea for her design on her cuffs and maybe a pattern for her dress. I don’t know what to make Mira’s cuffs for her though. Mira has healing powers from her hands and fertilizing powers from her feet, but she’s born with them and normally has complete control of them and I don’t see how her cuffs would have anything to do with her powers. She’s a major geography enthusiast, to the point where Silver jokes that she’s a walking GPS with wings, but I don’t see how her cuffs would be useful for her since she’s just that good with geography. Well, except for maybe looking up for coordinates, because I don’t plan on having Mira to be THAT thorough. Mira idolizes Sonic as a hero so much that she wants to be a hero like him and make the world a better place. So maybe she uses her cuffs to do research about him, but that would make her cuffs a smartwatch, so not an unique idea. I was almost in a rut, but I do have a headcannon that I would like to share:
According to the Sonic wiki page, there was a website for Sonic 2006 and it said that apparently, the people in Silver’s era have psychic powers, and it’s completely normal. The problem is that the site also has so many inaccuracies, that it’s likely non-cannon. But I still like the idea though. I like the idea that Silver is not the only psychic in his era and do you know what else are psychics? Telepaths. This doesn't apply to all telepaths but they’re, at best, a nuisance in Silver’s era, but at worst, very predatory. Always looking for someone vulnerable to prey on and exploit. Fortunately, there’s technologically advanced accessories that people can wear to protect them from the perverted mind-readers so Mira wears them for protection and yes Silver has them too. I mean even if Silver’s a telepath too, it shouldn’t mean he’s immune to them, so why not?
“the only other thing i might tweak about her clothes would be to add a secondary somewhere. i like the dark blue but it’s a bit overwhelming when it’s on every single part of her— changing or adding a color on the shoes or gloves would help. this can be small— only a single strip or panel would do. i’d recommend white or the same light blue color of her wings!”
I may be a little harsh on myself, but as I said before, drawing futuristic clothes are a bit of a learning curve for me because there’s so much variety of how people interpret it of what futuristic fashion would be like. Like say, The Jettsons’ atompunk style to Cyberpunk. Stressing myself on making it perfect doesn’t help either, especially since Mira’s original dress looks more like a regular modern dress if you get rid of the cuffs. However, I think I managed to make a passable futuristic dress. Do I like it? Not exactly, but I like it enough that I think it’s something that Silver’s people would wear and I’m gonna stick with it until I find a more satisfying futuristic dress for her. I decided to add a white strap onto her dress since Astro finds the blue a bit overwhelming. They also suggested adding white on her gloves and well, I did apply to that, but it ended up feeling unbalanced between white and blue, so went with gray.
“The biggest critique I have is her hair and skin tone. Bugs are not typically known for having hair or skin, so it feels a bit off. Try looking at photos of butterflies (or any insect that interests you) and see if you can find some interesting shapes on their heads. If you're married to the hair, I think it can work if you make it a less natural color, or pure black since that’s already in her design. If you end up going that route, a ponytail or braid would be cute and keep her hair away from her wings so she can fly more easily! the little curly bang is a good touch btw, it reminds me of a butterfly’s curled up proboscis”
The swirl is probably intentional and not just because I thought it’s a cute design. Anyways, Astrophysics brought up Charmy and Jewel as examples of Sonic bugs. Neither of them have hair and Charmy only gets away with it because of his helmet whereas his skin tone is because of his warm color palette. Jewel doesn’t have any hair but a shell and she has a white mussel to make her less of a human and more of a bug. Not gonna lie, at first I thought it was a little egregious since there’s only two official Sonic bugs. That is until I started to think about it. The more I think about it, the more it makes more sense and the more I realize that I might've made Mira more human-like and less bug-like. Not my intention. The hair is where I started next and let me tell you it’s not easy. I was looking up butterfly fur and found nothing but learned that apparently the fuzz on bugs aren’t fur nor hair but chitin which is
… that. I tried to have Mira’s antennas designed as braids or pigtails, like how Cream’s ears look like pigtails, but it ended up making her look like a dog. I tried to look up butterfly heads but they all look the same to me, except for the blue morphis butterfly
which I thought that’s the key to giving Mira a new hairstyle. Unfortunately, I couldn’t figure out how to draw Mira’s hairstyle based on the blue butterfly’s head. I mean I did try
but there’s just something about it that feels off. Don’t get me wrong, it has potential, I just need to find a new angle. Because I couldn’t figure it out yet, I stuck with the hair only this time, I tied it up like Astrophysics suggested and it’s a bubble braid because what better way than to emulate it as a caterpillar? Mira’s mussel was pretty tricky. In fact, I still don’t know what color is better for her. I tried a pastel blue, but it gives Mira a more icy feel, like she has ice powers. I tried giving her a pink mussel, but it felt weird. I tried a pastel yellow, but it still came out as skin-colored. I even tied a pastel grey, but it feels more off. Eventually, I nearly gave up with the mussel, but I stick with the pink since it’s supposed to be her secondary color. Blue is her primary color, which by the way if you’re wondering why her wings are different, is because I’m not good with consistency. I even forgot what shade of blue I used for her wings until writing the script where I was trying to figure out where to put Mira’s side view.
Speaking of wings, I didn’t mention this earlier and Astrophysics doesn’t know it either only because I didn’t tell them that (sorry Astro), but the real reason why Mira’s wings are blue and see-through is because her wings are made of graphene. For those who don’t know what graphene is, they’re a special type of material that’s thinner than paper and stronger than steel. I learned that from Big Hero 6 The Series, where a villain named Momakase
who has graphene blades as her weapons and her blades are see-through and dangerous. They can cut through anything like butter, even steel. That’s where I got the idea for Mira’s wings but with a spin, they’re detachable so she uses them as swords or knives as she pleases, but she never uses them to hurt people. In case Mira loses a piece of her wing, they regrow new ones. Also graphene is more flexible than rubber, which is something that I found out when doing my own research and because of that, I thought Mira can use them as restraints since that’s what she normally does when dealing with her enemies before resorting to fighting. Which, the more I talk about it, the more it’s making me second guess whether or not I should let her have graphene wings or give normal regular see-through wings and give her graphene blades hidden somewhere in her person. Mira has healing and fertilizing powers, is it really necessary to give her unusual wings? Why would I give graphene wings when she already has her own powers? That question is coming from my idea of how I like to think about Silver’s world: Not everyone has psychic powers nor are they restricted to only having psychic powers. They can have other powers and in Mira’s case, there’s butterflies that have wings that are other materials that aren’t scales. To elaborate, there’s butterflies that have wings that are made of electricity, water, copper, you name it and Mira doesn’t really stand out from her species of her era. But her healing and fertilizing powers does make her a target for all sorts of horrible people that want her powers for selfish or even power-hungry reasons. So Mira keeps them a secret with only Silver, Shadow and Omega knowing about them. And yes, I have Shadow and Omega to be at Silver’s era. Everything I said is really just a head-cannon of mine when it comes to Silver’s world and now I’m not sure if I still want to incorporate it. What do you guys think? I would love to hear some feedback from this after the video is over and Thank you so much @astrophysician so much for the feedback, I really appreciate it. Thanks for watching. Take care.
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