Illustration – Kitsunoh Variation (2022-01-01)
Design notes
This design is a variation on the fan-made Pokémon Kitsunoh, from Smogon's Create-a-Pokémon Project. My original intent was to create an original design, using Kitsunoh as an inspiration. However, I was unable to make the design different enough to call it original. Despite this, I am still able to share the design as a derivative product.
The central conceit of this design was to take Kitsunoh's features and make them friendlier in appearance. For this reason, I rounded out sharp points in the design. Places where I made this change include:
The markings on the design's primary mask
The mouth texture on the design's primary mask
The lack of ghostly wisps on the body
In addition, I updated the color scheme to fit. Places where I made changes include:
The irises (sinister red → innocent blue)
The sclerae (black → blue)
The masks (gray → light gray)
Lastly, I simplified the design where I felt it was appropriate:
I reduced the number of masks while still preserving the illusion of multiple heads.
I changed the body shape to be clean and lithe.
Inspiration notes
When making these changes, I was inspired by aspects of Japanese culture:
Since I settled on light gray as the color of masks, I drew additional inspiration from ceramics in designing the markings on the masks. Since Kitsunoh uses blue as a primary color, I styled the masks after blue-and-white pottery. However, I ran into concerns when designing the masks using this theme; blue-and-white pottery is associated with Chinese culture more than Japanese, and it is also associated with with dinnerware, which were implications I did not want. This led me to try alternate palettes and designs. However, I could not find a good balance of colors. Thus, I stuck with blue for this variation. Regardless of these concerns, there is thematic sense with using blue-and-white pottery on a Kitsunoh variation. The primary colorant used for blue is metal-based, which matches well with Kitsunoh being a Steel-type Pokémon.
Instead of the metallic strips, I decorated the primary mask with whiskers resembling shide. This change was made primarily for the cultural reference, but it plays into the original conceit well; shide are used to purify objects or, otherwise, to mark places of purity, which suggests that this Kitsunoh variation is "purer" than the original.
References
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