#open source characters

[opencharacters]

A Gift: 30 Open Source Characters

[ID: drawing of a girl with greywhite skin, blueish shirt, black skirt, striped knee high socks and four angel wings coming from her back and a halo. she got 4 eyes that make a butterfly pattern. her hair is pink with black stripe on front and blonde with a light blonde stripe towards the back END ID]

So throughout April I have been taking part in the 30 Days of Characters challenge over on ComicFury and thought it would be fun and dedcided from the getgo to make all characters that i make for this open source or creative commons (specifically CC BY 4.0) so everyone can use them as long as they credit me. So below are links to all the characters and a very brief description of them.

Pictured above is Daphiel, an anime and fanfiction nerd and banished archangel which was todays character and the last charactger of the challenge I thought would make good for like a thumbnail for the post.

Jenba (Jenny Everywhere as a 4 armed party robot)

Camcord (Person modified to have a camcorder for an eye)

Miss Xtra (unhinged assassin)

Apta Lee (young bounty hunter)

Octobrianne (Octopus Cyclops Alien Mob Boss)

CRTbbit (rabbit tv head person)

Queen Slitmouth (deep sea mermaid)

Demova (fallen angel)

Strawbemon (Demon, vaguely strawberry looking)

Skelletta (Skull headed angel)

Salva (Cybernetic Vampire)

Zuxia (Blue alien with many eyes)

Plasmatazz (Groovy DJ ghost)

Hellow (Robot Knight)

Clovacta (Floating head ghost)

Wam (Faceless punk ghost)

Lil Jackie (Punk girl with axe)

Macca (Fast food themed zombie)

Toltacus (Triangle demon)

Pepper Lace (Candy angel)

Tedly (Horned alien dude)

Babidim (Skull teddy bear)

Shadex (Shadow mob boss)

Professor Ambrosia (Hippy alien with tentacles)

Amoratos (Love God)

Lacey O'Mally (Alien farmer with two vertical eyes)

Famished Ghost (Angry looking ghost)

Count Vivi (Femme Vampire Goblin)

Valentine (Video Game Ghost)

Daphiel (Weeb Angel)

Over on ComicFury you can see each character as well as their backstories. So take a look. All are open source and free to use, so spread them and use as you see fit as long as you credit me and maybe message me about it because I wanna see what you come up with :D

This was quite the endurance to keep drawing new character every day but it was a lot of fun and I feel it enhanced both my writing and drawing abilities.

For more info on how it can be use check the page for CC BY 4.0 License, basically can do whatever just need to credit me, Sasha Henriksen and maybe link to my website ranmagender.com

[titleknown]

How Do I Get People Engaging With My Art As Infrastructure, And The Idea of Art As Infrastructure In General?

That's a bit esoteric, but let me explain. A big part of my work is releasing it into the Creative Commons to try and get folks to create other works using those settings or just plonking their characters into their own.

Previous efforts had been... well, dry, encyclopedic and not very good, but I've been improving as of late, recent projects include my September Bleeds story thing, Helloween, and Kaijune, which is a great point to show my growth there, compare and contrast my older stuff (under the Pseudo-Showa header) vs the newer stuff (under the Reiwa header). but still, nobody's biting. 

That relates to something I've noticed. I have this view of artistic "infrastructure" as a vital and important part of creative ecosystems, not just art as individual works, but as a shared set of narrative and aesthetic "tools" and framework people can build on.

The reason why I feel like I need to do this as an indie creator is because, aside from a few projects like the SCP Foundation and Fanpro, this sort of infrastructure building is done more or less solely by the private sector and kept under lock and key by copyright. 

Think stuff like Star Wars; Transformers; the DC and Marvel universes, ectcetera. I think that fucking sucks. I think the idea of shared worlds and universes are extremely useful as creative and artistic tools, something that is at once both a shared language and a shared set of tools to build on.

And my core questions are A) Why is this such a rare perspective and rallying point for activism and production wrt culture and B) Why doesn't my work seem to catch on with regards to people there?

I'm curious about your thoughts in the comments/reblogs, as I've gotten some responses to those questions that I'm integrating into my Plans, but I'm curious about other folks' thoughts...

[shipburner]

So, a bit of background for this one. MSPARP is still a fun site as long as you keep SFW on, and on August 10th last year, I got into a discussion about what Rose and Kanaya would name their child, and somehow landed on “Guilt”.

GA: Guilt GA: Maybe Thats What Ill Name My Child TG: thatll be great for its confidence TG: go for it GA: Theyll Grow Up To Be A Beautiful Anime Villain TG: holy fuck no man they need to be a jrpg villain TG: those doofy fucks are so fucking great TG: like some weird ass blue haired doofy lookin sonic the hedgehog edgy cloak guy TG: some stupid shit like that itd be fantastic TG: i want that as my niece of nephew TG: like you just cannot take em seriously no matter what GA: Exactly GA: Guilt Is The Perfect Name TG: but its gotta have one letter wrong TG: just that extra edge TG: like uh with a y TG: gylt TG: you can just see the sharpened overly seriffed font typing that out GA: Juilt TG: i would say that kind of doesnt work but its a jrpg it doesnt matter

And then I came out with ...

GA: Guil7

The Dave in this instance was perhaps even more impressed by this unholy channeling of a, quote, “shitty PS1 JRPG that never happened”, and we both lost it for a while. I said that I would draw Guil7, and it never happened, and then ... I was bored on the plane yesterday, and Guil7 finally came out at long last. Glory at their ornate robes, loreal fossae, and chainscythe.

Guil7 believes themself to be an embodiment of justice, and, even when not used as part of a Homestuck AU, is the child of an alien vampire and a cultist of eldritch horrors. This heritage allows them to see the guilt in your soul, or so they claim. Their ideas of what constitutes “justice”, however, are very ... immature, and their claims to serve some cosmic power don’t always hold water.

I’d like to think they’re a member of @titleknown‘s Game Bosses Union, and fill the archetype of “person who sounds like they know what they’re talking about when they really, really don’t”, who subsequently turns out to be a villain. They also have a particular flair for pretending to be an ally and member of your party, with machinations that LAY UNDETECTED FOR YEARS! There is a three-way hate triangle between them, Thelemas Rotas, and \*Edge Hellblood 666: Antichrist Primadonna*//; a lot of the other bosses have running bets on which deaths and/or romantic relationships will come of it.

And, in the spirit of the thing and because I’m not familiar enough with JRPGs to make a parody myself, Guil7 is free to use under a CC-BY Vanilla 4.0 License as long as I, Nausicaä Harris, am credited as their creator! Their hair is pale green, and their outfit has a green-black-and-purple color scheme; they can be any gender as fits the requirements of your story.

And, Dave Strider RPer, if you’re out there ... thank you so, so, so fucking much.

[cosmicbeholder]

Jenny Everywhere for @jennyeverywhereday 2017!

"The character of Jenny Everywhere is available for use by anyone, with only one condition: This paragraph must be included in any publication involving Jenny Everywhere, that others might use this property as they wish. All rights reversed."

Tales To Behold Read online | Comic Zines

[titleknown]

SEPTEMBER BLEEDS #4: THE ARM

Bored. Bored bored bored bored. That is what The Arm was,waiting outside the walls of the city. 

She hadn't had the stomach for the trash-tubes that Marian did, and everyone else was on other jobs, so here she was, stuck waiting on the hills of the information superhighway while the city sat under its "protective" dome like a gleaming diamond abcess.

"I don't think it's going to work this time," the Arm said to her contact through the package. She was playing a game of Super Mario War on it against her contact to occupy her time until the big ka-boom.

"Howcome?" the contact asked. His voice was a two-tone thing at once, sounding like a young boy and a rumbling dragon layered atop each other. "You trust me, and I presume you trust you, and Marian's good at what she does.."

"Firstly kid," the Arm interrupted "I don't trust me. Never have, never will. Second, Faust always fumbles the bag on jobs like these." 

The line fell silent for a moment. The Arm narrowly missed a jump on her forehead as her contact leapt past her... to find a 1-up. 

"Firstly," the voice said, "They're the ones who do the least-fun most-important parts of it, and they've only failed twenty-five percent of the time." The contact's Mario landed on the head of The Arm's "Secondly, you call me Kid every time you're a doomer about these things, I'm older than you by a wide margin."

"I know, I know" she said. A shit-eating grin spread on her eye as she leapt on her opponent's head. It was a trade. "That's why I'm here, ain't I? Plan's still on, I'm still here, I just think it helps to be realistic."

"You mean cynical."

"The fact you think there's a difference is why I keep with ya." she retorted. She made a jump, now her contact was one down. But the plan was still on. Marian distracts them, Faust sets them up the bomb, when a hole's blown in the dome, she; the Arm picks off the elites they do send, then her contact brings in the cavalry to usher out the folks Faust n Marian get on the bus (also her contact) and hopefully the ol' lady doesn't have to get involved too much. She's been through enough as it is.

Waiting here, it was a bit like the old times, her waiting alone for a fight against overwhelming odds. But, it was never a willing fight. In lightless times, one believes that hope rides alone.

 But hope dies alone too. But maybe, just maybe, she could believe for a moment they could win. With a little help from her friends...

...Game, set and match. The game between her and her contact was over. But who won didn't matter. Because the real game was just afoot, with a slash of claws, and a baleful, howling, cackle...

-----------------------------

It's another character! She's named after Here Comes The Arm from The Protomen; and the aesthetic; themes and implied backstory kinda flow from there. Not that much to say, at least not before tomorrow's entry...

Today's org is, well, it's a couple of people actually. Namely, NSFW Journalist Ana Valens and NSFW artist Dieselbrain are right at the forefront of this fight against payment processor tyranny and the whole age-verification fight that motivated this, So if you wanna keep abreast of the issues and learn what to do, they're probably your best shot. Tho, given their other areas, probably not at work, but still.

Also, as per usual with my narrative work, this story, character and all narrative elements are under a CC-BY 4.0 license, as long as I, Thomas F Johnson, am credited as their creator…  

[titleknown]

...So, for those who don't know,, I've been doing a project called Kaijune for several years now where I create a bunch of kaiju wit

Bad News: Tumblr won't let me fully edit the Kaijune masterpost, presumably due to all the external links. Which I blame on M@tt, who I hope gets dragged into hell by a giant hand not to die but to suffer, but I digress.

But good news is, I can still link the Pillowfort version! Suck it M@tt you transphobic cretin!

So, if you want to take a look at all my Kaijune entries, both in the older goofier continuity and the current, much darker newer one, have at it!

Maybe spread the word about the project, given all the stuff I've made for it is under a CC-BY 4.0 License, and I'd love to see more folks do stuff with it...

[titleknown]

Here's another design, this time based on a character by @mateulegrillepain named Gene Abello, an awful rancid tech CEO guy!

Fun fact, the belt buckle is an addition made by myself, and it's a mildly obscure movie reference! I'm curious if y'all can recognize which one!

Funner fact, the creator put this character under a CC0 Public Domain license, and so with their permission, I put this image under CC0 too!

Do whatever you like with 'em, just don't make it boring!

[titleknown]

OKAY, SO, I've heard a lot of folks talk about wanting to put their stuff under Creative Commons licenses, but being worried about megacorps using it and pulling up the ladder.

Which, I'd probably agree, is a sensible worry. Which is why I'm sharing this license with y'all that I found that does a really good job of addressing that!

Basically, it allows for people to use your work with creator credit even commercially, but only if it's on their own or as a part of a worker-owned enterprise.

So, it provides almost the maximum rights possible to the smaller creators this sort of thing is meant to benefit, while still keeping it away from the greedy megacorp bastards.

It's super cool, but it seems like I'm the only one who's heard of it, so that's why I'm boosting it! I'd love to see what works folks apply it to in the future...