Character Designs! (Patreon)

Howdy folks. I am home sick today again. Seem to be on the mend but damn does my body ache. It's one of those, you know? where it hurts to run your fingers through your own hair?

Pain in my ass. And of course there will be some playful chiding at work when I return about enjoying a four day weekend. If only any of this were enjoyable...

I digress.

I'm flirting with the idea of doing a fictional comic. A low fantasy piece. The idea came from listening to this music.

As such my vision was the protatgonist be a man from Central Asia, however as you can see from my sketches I wasn't quite willing to draw the necessary features of someone from said region.

The problem which simply is there's a lot of racist fuckery in comics, particularly fantasy comics.

So often we see one or all of the following problematic elements:

• People of color replaced w/ non-human characters

• Use of non western culture on western characters

• Story taking place in specific culture region without said culture present

• Use of culture without any understanding of said culture.

One of my favorite comics from the last 5 years is Craig Thompson's "Habibi" but later it was pointed out that in a story so heavily reliant on Islam, not a single time do any of the characters practice any traditional Muslim prayers/ceremonies/customs.

There's a fascination with "the other" that us White artists tend to have, and sadly it's often carried out without much consideration.

All of this merits a lot of thought/planning before starting. I like my works to be air tight if possible (this is of course impossible) so as not to make an ass of myself.

My wife feels it's fine to include an Asian protagonist so long as he is not a token in a sea of Whiteness. I tend to agree, were it not for the fact that there are essentially only three characters in this story. Contrary to common understanding there were plenty of POC during medieval times.  I have no time for all White fantasies.

Time will tell, I guess.