Sketches of whatever flavor of randomness or nerdy obsession I happen to be infected with this month. Lots of cute things, couples, and pointy elf ears. she/her pronouns, age 36ish
More progress on elemental 🪝🌺. At first I was gonna make maui's hair out of flames and have the wings be more of a direct carry over from his hawk form. but as I got playing with it i really liked the contrast of the black so I made it smoke instead of flames. gives it kind of te fiti vs te ka vibe doesn't it? Their respective skin colors aren't going together as well as I'd like so imma probably fix that before I move on to maui's other wing.
The flame feathers are super fun to play with but I keep going over them over and over because I go back and forth on how plausible vs abstract to make them, ya know? Like, I got a bunch of reference photos of raptor birds air breaking over water to get the wing pose, and a couple references of fire dancers swinging flames around and I intend to use them...but at the same time I have the hook and sun imagery I want to include and make it uniquely "Maui as a fire & air elemental" vs "Maui stapled to generic Phoenix wings." Moana the plant mermaid has a very clear delineation between her plant (land) and ocean halves, with just a little intermixing of the themes at the borders (the seashells in her headdress, plant based clothing, fish fun ears). But maui's two halves are like...fire colors and flame motifs all over but he has wings? Do the feathers read as air enough for the concept? Does his hair being smoke add to the fire side or the air side? I could give him one fire wing and one air wing but i think it would look way too disjointed. Perhaps the inner wing is the flame colors and patterns but I push the air motif more on what we see of the back of the wings. Or maybe I should be trying to make moana's two sides blend more to match him? *YouTube voice* Lemme know your thoughts in the comments.
Also I think I went overboard on the ferns and now moana's hair is giving Christmas tree garland. XP time to dial back the red
I'm aiming for a tarot card feel, with maui being air/fire to moana's land & sea, very sun coded.
I got way too into drawing ferns and now my joints hurt from hyper focusing and not stretching for hours 🙃
Debating on if moana should have the mermaid tail of a specific fish (like the homuhomunukunuapua'a, hawaii's state fish) or lean into her being half made of water like an elemental.
Inspired by r/astrology and that quote from ever after about a fish loving a bird.
I am Moana / Of the land and of the sea / And I promise that is who I'll always be
Deaf West Theatre worked with Disney to do ASL translations of several of their recent musical numbers (all reanimated by human artists based on references from human performers, to be clear).
I can't remember if I've posted some of these before but here's a sketch dump of some moana stuff from way back in 2020/21
The bottom right image is of Honu, my hooked wayfinder fanchild, but as a young adult. Fun story, the date on there was when I was over at my friends' house, turning him into a d&d character for a campaign we were all starting. THE EXACT SAME DAY the state of Ohio (usa) announced their shut down plans for Covid & put out all the strongly wording earnings against public indoor gatherings. 😬 my friends were all getting calls & texts from their work telling them if they had to go in for their next shift or not. Meanwhile my unemployed ass was like;
Female presenting nude chest under cut to own the mod bots:
(If I go back & refine this one I'll add her new tattoos to make it crystal clear she's over 18)
Today, in the spirit of family, I wanna talk about Puanani Cravahlo & her character in Moana & Moana 2. <3
credited only as "villager #2", we know from interviews that she is the mother of Auli'i Cravahlo (the voice actress for moana). Her character is the briefly seen villager woman who comes up to moana and reports about the coconut blight, then tells tui and sina "She's doing great!"
but thats not the only time we see that character, whom I'll now be referring to as puanani, and calling the human Mrs. Cravahlo. (fun fact, puanani means 'beautiful flower' in hawaiian)
it seems puanani has been in moana's life since moana was very young, and seems to show up most around the coconut harvesters.
She's one of the women who help make moana's Tuiga, a special headdress reserved for the chief's heir to wear on formal occasions. in samoa, the headdress is made with feathers, shells, and dyed human hair- hair from the wearer's ancestors, bleached in seawater, added for spiritual and symbolic protection. traditionally, its thought a person's mana can be stored in their hair, (it being so close to the head, a mana source,) so only people close to the person or of high mana themselves would be the one's handling the sared material. disney's artbook says moana's tuiga is made from dyed grasses, but i don't think its too far off base to assume that the people most likely to be the ones making the headdress for their next chief are either people closely related to the chief or belonging to the Aliki (ali'i in hawaiian) aka the polynesian high class.
puanani also has a front row seat at tui's council meetings, a spot traditionally reserved for the leaders of the community. in samoa these are known as the Matai, the chiefs, and you can become one either by inheriting the title or by being nominated thru merit. a family group would have a Matai as their head, but so would many of the village industries, like the Chief farmer or the Chief fisherman. so its possible she's up there as the Chief Coconut Grower, but just as likely due to being of the right bloodline.
her final appearance in the first Moana is on moana's flagship canoe in the reprise scene of We Know the Way, and looking once again at real life history, we know that polynesian wayfarers tended to travel in family groups, the larger main family canoes supported by smaller scout crafts. The fact she's hanging out on moana, tui, and sina's boat, along with several others who show up slinging coconuts in Where You Are, cements her likely position as a close family relative.
and she shows up in moana 2! most distinctly in leading the island in song as they see moana and crew off on their journey. This time its Te vaka's Vocalists supplying her singing voice, not Mrs. Cravahlo, but the character is unmistakably the same. same face, same accessories, same dress pattern, same body shape. the only difference is the darkening of her dress color, but this also could be a trick of the lighting.
while Disney is guilty of reusing a lot of faces, dresses and accessories in it's background characters, we dont see that many women in the films wearing that plain leaf crown in their hair, and fewer with the right combination of stout, round face and flower dress with loose hair. so despite not getting a good view of her front, i do think she's also the character who hands moana a flower crown at her welcome home feast, which fits with her previous experience at helping make moana's tuiga.
so, taking all these clues, here's my take on Puanani the character:
I think it likely that she is moana's aunt, one of sina's sisters. why sina and not tui? because while she is present at tui's council meetings, she doesnt appear at tala's bedside. there are a few non-named characters hanging about the fale, and one of them does look like the other unnamed woman who helped with moana's tuiga, but not puanani. and even the other tuiga maker is off hiding in the shadows, awkwardly pacing and not coming close, unlike unnamed bun woman and the tween armband boy in the corner. its possible puanani hasnt arrived yet, but i feel that if she was meant to deliberately be tui's sister-coded she would have been there at their mother's passing.
at council we see puanani next to this strapping man, who sports tattoos and fine patterned layers of skirt, indicating he too is someone of status. Possibly her husband? They're sitting pretty close to one another in a pretty open area...
in this shot we see her without the red & white shell armbands she sports when talking to moana, but right there in frame is possibly where theyve gone to- a younger man without tattoos. Her grown son perhaps? and then is the young woman on her right a daughter? or a daughter in law?
we see the pair again, dancing through the groves (left,center) with moana and puanani (on the right).
So I think it's not unreasonable to headcanon that puanani is sina's sister, married with a grown son and daughter-in-law. lets throw in that jumping kid seen frequently running around her feet as a potential grandson. One of her jobs is to help with the coconut harvest and husk them, reporting to the chief on any problems with their vital crop. she also seems pretty skilled with her hands, enjoying wearing and making crowns, jewelry. she's generous with her gifts, adorning her family members in her handiwork. she compliments moana on a great job, albeit indirectly, and by implication sina and tui on their parenting. She leads singing and sits up front in council meetings. she's strong enough to sling around huge baskets of coconuts, but needs help with the larger hauls.
"oh no he's hot" -puanani and her friend, probably.
anyway, i just think it's neat that there's a disney animator out there who cared enough to include puanani and be pretty consistent with how and where she shows up and with who. it makes motonui feel more like a real place, to see characters repeated deliberately and with some forethought into what they're doing and who they're with.
ps. happy belated mother's day to the real Puanani Cravahlo, who gave us the treasure that is Auli'i <3
Announcing Fale Family Fest, a moana fandom event celebrating all forms of family with art, fic, meta... are all welcome.
Running from Mother's day to father's day 2025, feel free to participate with the tag #falefamilyfest. Art, fic, meta... are all welcome.
Though the event was conceived in the hooked wayfinder discord, entries need not be shippy. To quote @hookedwayfinder : "It also doesn't need to be wholesome. It could be a heartwarming tale of Moana and Maui starting a family, but also a horror tale of Tamatoa eating his grandma. It's also not necessary to make it Hooked Wayfinder - it can be any ship or character you like and we open it to non-shippers too."
for more details please contact @cartoonjessie at her home blog or her dedicated Moana blog @hookedwayfinder, where all the entries will be featured. <3
A complilation of all the elemental outfits i did for moana x avatar the last airbender day, for your reblogging convenience.
I had so much fun with this concept, especially in getting to play polynesian fashion designer ^^ with each iteration I feel like I got better and better at rendering the textures and elemental effects, and i couldn't be happier :D happy moanatla day!
SURPRISE BONUS! Water moana cuddling a very familiar & adorable sea turtleduck. (Originally a request from @thehighpriestessofcuddles on the hooked wayfinders discord )
The duck I based him on is an Australian wood duck aka a "maned duck". I couldn't resist those lovely locks and graphic pattern <3
I am super happy how these came out, especially the fire effects ^^ I debated going with azula or ty Lee for the warm up, but figured since I'd done most of team avatar up to this point, it was only fair to zuko to include him. (Sorry sokka!) I gave her zuko's crown but his last agni Kai outfit because to me that's the outfit he's in when he cements his place as "good guy firebender".
Ty Lee's style made it in to moana's fire island princess outfit though! Geographically moana's tropical island would be most likely in/near the first nation, and her canon outfits don't skimp on the red! Red in ye olde polynesia is often reserved for the chiefs/ members of the ruling class, so she looks quite at home in flame colored garb. This is her most princessey outfit I've drawn her in and I had a ton of fun with the lighting and textures.
Probably this is my best one out of the four, and part of me wants to go back and bring the water outfit up to this level because water tribe is my fave! But my fingers are falling off from all this drawing and I stayed up way too late finishing these >.<
While moana can be stubborn and steadfast, I don't think anyone can beat toph for toughness! While the blind bandit slings boulders, I think the island loving moana is more likely to specialize in beachbending. The outfit this time is more based on her mother and the original wayfaring ancestor's look, a mix of fresh green materials and woven garments. Looking at the earth kingdom fashions for more girly girls, I noticed a lot of long skirts, sleeves and layering, which is a hard sell for a girl from the tropics. My compromise was in ti leaf & vine arm decorations, and putting all the wrapped fabric around her waist, sina style. The underdress I imagine is long strands of dried seaweed/kelp and her jewelry is obsidian.
Went with air next, for that main character energy and cause I was feeling playful :D
I debated putting moana in the air nun outfit instead, but I'd already done her cosplaying katara so I figured I'd continue with warming up with the members of team avatar cosplays before leaping in to the good stuff of texture and pattern ^^ I hit upon making the air nomad cape out of dried grasses early on and kept stuffing it all over XD that and the orange gives her almost a melanesian vibe- a happy accident that fits quite well in the end. Wanted to use tassels on the ends of her over skirt to make the decorations more different from how I used fringe in the water tribe outfit. I put plover footprints on her sash and triangle elements to call back to the airbender arrow motif. The dark blocky pattern on her skirt also appears on movie-maui's wrist, and references the myth of him trapping the world's winds in a gourd, all but one (I forget if it was north south east or west), so he could fly his favorite kite XD
Here's where I start playing around with different movements for the element she's bending, and how it might look different in moana's hands versus the avatar character she's emulating. The next one really shows that off. Look forward to it!
First in a series of renders that will get progressively better lol. Water is 100% moana's element, so it felt natural to try it first
I started with drawing moana cosplaying katara to get a feel for the water tribe color palette and warm up to a more original concept. That being "what would moana look like as each of the different element benders?" Trying to marry the form language and palette from avatar with the materials and fashion of motonui. On katara the white trim is fur, but on moana its feathers and fringe. Let's pretend moana's people have access to some really good color fast dyes in this universe, mKay?
In my head, bending in this au is more dancing than martial arts, using mana instead of chi. (And maui is the DANCEMASTER 🕺🎉✨️)
In the hooked wayfinder discord, we discovered that many of us are veterans of the Avatar: the last Airbender fandom and thought it could be fun to cross the streams 🌊 for a little April Silliness :D
I have prepared this doodle as a herald for more foolery to follow ;3
Do you have any Hooked Wayfinder headcanons that you'd like to share with us? - love from the Hooked Wayfinder blog
I've probably said this before somewhere but I am delighted to repeat myself here:
My headcanon is that Maui is Pansexual, Panspecies, Polysexual & Demiromantic. He's 3000 years old, doesn't look a day over 30 and has the body and stamina of a demigod. He's tried a little bit of everything at least once. Even minus the thousand years exile, 3000 years is a long time, he's bound to get bored sometimes and go looking for novel new experiences. He's adventurous by nature, a born wanderer- which makes him short on commitment but long on philandering. But if he does fall for someone he falls hard. Sometimes painfully hard, as he outlives all his mortal partners and has trouble regulating his emotions from all his past trauma. Deep down He wants love and home and family but doesn't want/is too frightened to be vulnerable with people.
Even with other immortals he's got the classic maladaptive defense mechanism of trying to drive away anyone who gets too close; the "reject them before they get a chance to reject me" mindset. He's full of contradictions and hypocrisy, but that's the only way he knows how to stay sane. He's been the "hall pass"/other man/reoccurring fling/ third wheel/ bi-unicorn for many, many couples over the centuries and he tells himself that it's exactly the way he prefers to be. But on those lonely nights in calm seas...he longs for a true equal who loves him and who he can love above all else. He'd be good with not being their only love interest, so long as theyre one another's main squeeze.
Moana is bisexual, IMO, just like her voice actress Auli'i Cravahlo. Romance hasn't been much of a priority for her the last few years, the ocean is so vast and exciting and her people keep her busy. Maui was her first crush- starting when he showed off all his sailing/wayfinding skills on their journey. If you ask her parents however, they'll claim she had a crush on him from way back when tala regaled her with stories of his exploits. She will deny this vehemently while turning red. "I didn't want to be *with* him, I wanted to BE him! C'mon! What little kid hasn't dreamed about being an animal whenever they want??"
Since maui she's picked up little crushes on her friends moni & loto but all three are so deep in their hobbies/jobs they're all guilty of missing dates and plans to meet up. most of moana's spare time has gone into exploring off island lately, and it's there that her candle for maui burns brightest. She's constantly reminded of their journey together (this whole headcanon is from the perspective of between movies) as she applies his lessons on wayfinding and makes new discoveries. She holds imaginary conversations with him, thinks up quips to use on him, mentally rehearses the anecdotes she'll share when she meets him again.
