Mary (Final Fantasy VI) Sketches 3

Thought I'd engage in a quick hit of self-indulgence while I slowly chip away at a project I've put on the backburner for months.

I am content. 😌

Blossom Princess

After nearly a full year of being smitten by this woman (again) and struggling to create anything due to a combination of my art block, my busy job and my desire to spend more time in the outdoors, I've finally been able to make proper fan art of my favorite Final Fantasy character of all time. This has truly been a long time coming for me.

And God bless her new outfit in Dissidia Duellum for making this possible. I'm genuinely very happy to see how she actually looks with her hair down in 3D. She looks absolutely gorgeous. I already can't wait for her summer outfit. 😏

Crossroads (Part 2)

Watching the ball roll on this new comic makes me feel so excited. 😄

Still thinking about a name, but I'm not finding one that satisfies me. I'll be camping this weekend so I think I'll just brainstorm further then. ⛺

Crossroads

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Crossroads (Part 1)

Oh no... Not me starting comics while I have others still in progress 💀💀💀

For my own pure self-satisfaction and the fact that it's been driving me insane lately thinking about these two, I've decided to start a series of fancomics solely dedicated to exploring the relationship between Terra and my OC Mary.

I'm still thinking of a name for this series. I'm going to need to think about it for a good while...

Crossroads

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Mary (Final Fantasy VI) Sketches 2

This was going to be another reference sheet for Mary... But then my mind drifted to just wanting to see some kind of interaction between her and Terra. It's so nice to see them again like this in my current art style. 😊

I also tried to see how well I could draw people in sitting poses from the front. I'd say this isn't too bad, eh? 😄

Mary (Final Fantasy VI) Sketches 1

A wanderer journeying aimlessly throughout the world with her black chocobo, Gust. Spry and easygoing, she has a go-getter attitude about most things, though she can be impatient and short-tempered at times. But Mary is a loyal friend through and through, and will stand up and fight to defend the weak and especially the people she cares about... Whoever they might be.

Certainly not her parents or family, after she'd been abandoned by them in her youth. Resorting to petty theft and scrappiness to survive, she lived the scavenger's life for a while, barely getting by to survive. Eventually, she wound up in the company of a swordsman who easily overpowered her when she tried to pilfer his gil sack away from him. While having just been humbled by him, she was in awe of his strength and desired to be the same. She followed him around for a time, trying to get him to teach her how to be as strong as he was. Her attempts were rebuffed, though he ended up taking her under his wing as both his student and stepdaughter. Her years spent with him would one day hone her into the fine warrior she's become in the present day.

At his deathbed, he bade her no longer try to find a cure for his illness; instead, he wanted her to journey across the land and discover more of the world and herself. And so she would at his passing, though she would find herself struggling to find a sense of belonging wherever she went. Her stepfather had been the only family she knew, and even with Gust's company, she yearned for other people who felt as lonesome as she did.

While sheltering from the cold in the Narshe Mines, Mary finds a woman collapsed from the remains of a cave-in, alive yet barely conscious. Joined eventually by a certain self-proclaimed treasure hunter and the local moogles, Mary fights through the waves of guards and their trained monsters pursuing the woman, spurred by an urge to protect her. Little did the wanderer know then that she would become such a significant presence in her life, easily making friends with her and connecting through a shared feeling of isolation... And inevitably roping her into the war against the Gestahlian Empire to save the world.

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I've been in a mood to just sketch things lately. I don't have a lot of time these days to focus on anything particularly grand so it's easier—and frankly more relaxing—to just indulge in sketchdumps like this.

Anyway. Mary is a Final Fantasy VI OC I've had since I was 13-14 years old. At the time, I had just started playing the Advance version of the game. I thought it would be cool to have a self-insert OC who was kind and good-natured while also being headstrong and brave to the point of recklessness; you could say it was a personality type that I greatly admired especially on a female character because I used to be very shy, lonely and withdrawn back then.

Over the years, and after I came to fully accept that perhaps I am attracted to other women, I fully recognized my own little girlcrush on Terra by writing some guilty pleasure snippets of fan fiction exploring Mary's relationship with her. The dynamic between a brash, easygoing, yet stubborn warrior and a shy, soft-spoken, and sweet woman is one of my favorite opposites attract tropes and this especially highlights that. I suppose it's just the knowledge of how a quiet person like Terra can manage to rein in Mary's storm that I simply find so charming.

With Dissidia Duellum having come out recently... I've been feeling pretty inspired by Final Fantasy characters arriving in Tokyo and seeing how adorable Terra is on my home screen. It makes me want to just engage in more content of these two, drawing their interactions together both in their world and in Tokyo. Or just making Terra content in general. Ugh, it's like going through my Arc brainrot during my Housamo era all over again. 😆

Lighting Study 5 + Terra Sketch(es) 3

Lighting practice but with Terra as my model. Well, my design of her, at least.

I feel more confident about her anatomy here compared to the one a few days ago.

Terra Sketch(es) 2

Indulging in another Terra sketch because oh my god the new Dissidia for mobile has been announced and she looks so cute...

I wanted to just stick to a simple sketch but one thing led to another and now it has color and (sloppily added) cel shaded rendering. Like all the rest of the Studytober art pieces so far, this isn't particularly a serious work, though I am not proud of how much time I invested in it (at least 5 hours). And now it's almost 6 a.m. Good lord.

Anyway, I'll definitely have a more serious Terra art piece soon... I hope...

Terra Sketches 1

Man. I haven't drawn Terra in ages. It's definitely a breath of fresh air seeing her in my style today compared to before. I should dredge up my old Terra sketch from the early 2010's. It's probably sitting locked away in my old dA account  vault somewhere.

I was actually supposed to do another set of eye sketches, because me and a friend thought it would be funny to look at it like the eye-mouth-eye emoji combination (an inside joke between us). But I was feeling uninterested in drawing more eyes after I finished with mouths, and I decided I wanted to indulge in some fangirling and draw Terra after seeing all the fan art of her flooding my Twitter. 🥰

Apparently there's a hashtag called #1日1ティナ that's gone viral and it's everyone and their dog posting one art piece of Terra everyday. I figure it's because October is also her birthday month so that's a thing. Not gonna lie though, I am eating good with all the Terra content... But I thought I'd also want to add in my contributions. 😋

This also turned into a bit of a study on hair and bangs again, in addition to putting my previous study of eyes to good use. I would have loved to make more for this post, but I ended up being pressed for time at the end of the day. I settled for just four sketches of her for now; I'm very keen on making more again some time later in the challenge.