#iceloidic

[gutsssee]

minor spoilers for this wonderful modern au gyjo fic by @iceloidic !!

chapter 6: bound to trip

chapter 7: should release

its so AWESOME!! amazing characterization and prose!!! high high high recommend!!!

[phidont]

This might come across more as asking for advice, but I’m someone who has never created any kind of OC, and I truly admire people who can bring their ideas together to create something. So I’m really interested in how you started Delta, and how you developed the storyline and characters.

So for Delta specifically, things are a little fuzzy caused they're old characters! But I know the idea blossomed from a. The amount of horror and forensic files I consumed as a child, and b. My love for Zero Escape. A is self explanatory, and B is because that series was insanely influential to my developing brain, so some key things like the name being Delta, and the chainsaw turned axe are directly connected to Zero Escape. In general, I think all my ocs start with a concept I'm really intrigued by or some small thing I've latched onto, and then I start to draw out a character design within that concept. With a drawing done, I then start to flesh out more of the surrounding details, basically branching out from this origin character (and likely go back to them and fix them up when I have a more clear idea)

With Delta, it started with wanting a character with a chainsaw (after Akane in ZTD), which turned into a serial killer and then I designed Delta as she is and took ZE's Greek letter naming conventions for her name. Jun was developed next as a detective to oppose her, and while designing her I landed on the idea of the two of them being mirrors of one another which became a really important aspect of the story as things kept developing. Loralei (formerly Wednesday) and Ash came next. Kiyomi didn't come for a little bit, and Celeste even later than her. Sometime when I was in high school I did ref sheets for students at the school and I got so attached to Celeste I made her Kiyomi's best friend and worked her into the plot.

I tend to do that a lot with Delta especially, where I'll do something not as thoughtfully and get too attached to it so it becomes worked in more genuinely. The biggest example is Kiyomi's wedding dress, which started as a Halloween drawing and now is a distinct look of hers and incorporated into the finale.

Looping back, I'm not sure if I have any real advice I can give about developing stories. I sort of just get a lot of ideas and dump them into a word document before sorting them out into something cute and formatted. Take in a lot of varied media, pick out what makes you like them so much. Look to your favorite artists and authors and whoever else and do the same. And if it helps, jot down when something really stands out to you so you can revisit it when it's time to create!

More on developing characters though! Since you asked about that as well. I like to design their more core attributes intentionally early on, and let the little details come organically (basically whatever feels right, like Kiyomi being a gambler). So playful killer, serious detective. Serious detective, light hearted partner (and easy going wife). Even Kiyomi and Delta are on opposite ends a bit with Kiyomi being very reserved and Delta being very cheeky and.. I don't know the word at the moment but almost forceful. In short, I try to avoid a group with all the same personalities because that doesn't give you much room to let dynamics occur. I also don't like to develop my characters to service to plot too much. Like I enjoy them being able to exist beyond their narrative purpose if that makes sense. I want Jun to feel like a person, not just a detective on a tough case. Or I want them to almost work against themselves. It I feel shouldn't be too easy. If Jun is the best detective in all the land, then she's not struggling at all to identify the killer and there's a much less interesting story to be told. I'm not an expert though so take all this with a grain of salt.

Also just have fun with it! Not every oc needs to have some greater purpose. Like to me Delta is a project that matters a lot, and I'd love to finish and publish it one day (and my Elysium ocs are my babies too), but I have a lot of ocs that just exist to be cool. Right now even I'm very hooked on the concept of Vampire nun and even though I have no place for her in a story, I fully intend to make her just to be drawing another beautiful woman.

This is a very big ramble and I may have just like.. said nothing.. so sorry but hopefulyl somewhere in there you can find some insight into my process. It really is a big in the moment improvisation for me I fear ;-;