Two years ago today, I posted the original character sheets for the Chain as Cryptids au, and I could not be happier with the way things have unfolded. Two years later, and I’m still surprising myself with the story and pushing myself to make better drawings. This au continues to connect me with just about the most supportive community I’ve ever been in, and continues to introduce me to some of the kindest, most creative people I’ve ever met.
I’ll be opening up CAC art requests for a short time to celebrate, but please bear with me as I am a very stressed animation student, and things just got very busy!
To everyone that has joined me in the past year and everyone that has been here from the beginning, thank you so much! I hope to continue to create, and am so excited to see what the next year brings!
Oohhhhhhh, your animatic looks so cool!!!!!!!! 🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷
Ummm, you mentioned asking questions about it..... Would you tell us more about the black portal thingie, maybe? Is the woods location a generic forest or did you have a specific place in mind?
Also, please do rant about anything you'd like to talk about with it, I'm not the best at asking questions but I'd love to hear anything you're willing to share! 🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷
In reference to THIS animatic!
FIRST OFF, let’s talk about portals!
In my au, there are a few different ways that our heroes can be moved around. Most commonly would be portals! There are two very distinct types of portal, and the one featured in the animatic was a Dark Portal.
Dark Portals are chaotic in nature, and usually pose more of a risk to the Cryptids. They tend to scramble Four’s head up the most and split the group up more often than not. In contrast, Light Portals are usually much more gentle. While they might give Four a headache, it’s nothing compared to the sickness of the Darkness. And Light Portals tend to be only for transportation- the group will realize that monsters never come out of Light Portals, only Dark ones.
Everyone theorizes that the different portals have different sources. They believe that the Unknowable- or some other evil entity- is creating the Dark ones, trying to weaken them or surprise them. They haven’t quite come to an agreement about the Light Portals, but a few of them are adamant that they must be the product of the Goddesses.
The animatic is a canon story, in which Four is separated from the rest of the Cryptids after a nasty Dark Portal broke the group apart. And a fun thing about Dark Portals is that they almost always drop monsters.
Almost always.
This time… it dropped a familiar face, all but on top of them.
At the end of the animatic, they both leave through another Dark Portal. And this is where Four maybe comes to a rather unsettling conclusion: that Shadow, maybe a little bit, has some kind of control over Dark Portals. After all… he’s a Shadow borne of the Dark Mirror.
If Cryptid Four is Enby, is Cryptid Shadow also Enby? Do all the colors identify as the same gender or do they identify differently? Apparently this is keeping me up at night
The colors are all their own people, and they do identify differently! Four, as we know them, is nonbinary. They use they/them pronouns. But the colors are different!
Red uses any/all (no gender, just vibes)
Blue uses he/she/they (gender fluid. They’ll tell you their preferred pronouns at any given time)
