Art by Kaiju Bunny and ausma
Ever wanted a place to show off your OCs? Ever interested in sharing their lore? Want a place to ask for critique or suggestions with building your own OCs?
Smeargle's Studio welcomes you to OC Central!
Addressing the obvious: What is an OC?
To put it simply, an OC, or "Original Character," is a custom character you make for yourself! This can be an Original Character from your own original world, or a fan character from an existing franchise (e.g. Pokémon, Star Wars, Splatoon, etc.).
Another question that may pop up is: How do I make an OC?
If you'd like to start creating, our very own ausma has made the following guide below!
OCs are a weird concept to grasp at first, especially if you haven’t really made them before. However, in a vacuum, making an OC is not unlike an author writing a story and characters interacting with it; in fact, that is quite literally what is happening. Making an OC more or less means that you’re in that writing position, and have the ability to create the character as you please. However, it can be really difficult to really make a character if you do not know where to start! So, let me give you some tips as someone who’s been involved in the creative scene for nearly a decade.
Advice #1: Be Inspired
To me, I feel like the reason and thrill behind making the character is by far the greatest motivation behind why I do it, and truthfully I think meaning in general is beyond the greatest force when it comes to feeling fulfilled and satisfied with your work. I’ve noticed that OCs that are made for the sake of “well, I should make one” tend not to feel very satisfying, or really have any qualities that feel special or impactful to the creator. You get this meaning, almost always, through inspiration.
There is no real thing as a purely original character, contrary to popular belief. Every character you see nowadays takes traits and attributes from other existing forms of media or real, existing things. By definition… they are “memes', even. Hell, characters you may expect to be purely original take inspiration from pre-existing things. Darth Vader’s design and concept, for example, was hugely inspired by the Japanese feudal era, and moreover, he is hugely rumored to have taken direct inspiration from Doctor Doom (seriously, look it up). In other words, it’s ok to take inspiration from pre-existing things and reimagine these concepts into their own entities. What you personally are inspired by leaves a distinctly individual mark on both the meaning and execution of your character. This kind of inspiration is really important because it is what defines the fulfillment and meaning of the process. Don’t let yourself get caught up in “oh you stole this and that from x character”; the only time this ever applies is if you stole the concept and execution verbatim which is an incredibly rare, subjective, and facetious thing to quantify.
In essence, the journey that leads to the final character tends to be the thing that defines the impact and fulfillment involved in creating and designing characters. Let yourself have fun; it’s ok to take inspiration from things and make the experience fun for yourself.
Advice #2: Be Deliberate
A very common mistake a lot of new creators tend to make is that, without really thinking much about it, they add a ton of things and bloat the content of the character without considering how different parts of the character interact with one another. To be deliberate, in essence, is to know what to apply to one character and what to save for another. Think of it like you’re making a team for your favorite Pokemon Showdown format; you want to ensure that parts of their character all work together to create a cohesive whole. You wouldn’t want to put an Unaware Quagsire on a Hyper Offense since it has little to no offensive presence and only exists to sap momentum, instead that’s something you would want to save for a Stall team to check setup wallbreakers. The same applies to OCs. Making a character a master sword fighter while also making them a dedicated mage, god, and pacifist that runs an animal-safety association are incredibly conflicting because they literally just do not work together unless you add a ton of complex strings to their backstory and history, which can make it really difficult to focus your inspiration and far easier to get overwhelmed in the long term.
Things like backstories, for example, can play heavily into the design of the character. Scars, clothing choices, personality, and vibes are all things that can be influenced by the backstory, and are even things that influence each other. It’s because of this that generally being consistent helps make your character feel more like a distinct, cohesive individual, and with it, you can focus your inspiration far better without feeling like you have to dance from detail to detail just to get everything you want in one character. Being deliberate, though, is adding as much as you feel is necessary toward building the whole of the character or how much you actually want to complete for them in the first place. It’s up to you to decide how much you add and what your limits are for the character; just be aware of those limitations in the first place, watch out for moments when you are getting overwhelmed fleshing them out, and know when to stop.
Advice #3: Make Mistakes
This sounds incredibly counter-intuitive, but to me it’s something that I think can be insanely valuable for beginners. Everybody starts out somewhere and, frankly, it’s not realistic to expect yourself to do everything perfectly and find your ideal imaginative process from the get go. Not only does that make the process not fun, but it also can lead to being overloaded and can defeat the point of making the character in the first place. This plays back into my first tip, where meaning and inspiration should be what drives the process as opposed to making a “perfect character” for the sake of making a “perfect character”, unless that’s what’s inspiring you.
I’m incredibly experienced and even I make a lot of mistakes. People who have known me for a long time know that I make a ton of bloated backstories and make a lot of questionable worldbuilding decisions. Without making those mistakes in the first place, I wouldn’t be able to really understand what makes the process tick for me and recognize my flaws without seeing them in execution. In fact, that is what helps you improve in the first place: retrospection is really powerful for anybody, including creators.
Remember, too, that you’re not locked into the character and details as soon as you “finalize” them. There is no such thing as finalizing a character. Sometimes, characters get completely reworked and go through the wringer numerous times before coming to a point where the creator is satisfied, and even then if the circumstances change, the character may experience even more change. The key thing to consider is that making mistakes is a perfectly normal part of the process and that making mistakes can retain your focus and, above all else, enjoy the process without overloading yourself.
Advice #1: Be Inspired
To me, I feel like the reason and thrill behind making the character is by far the greatest motivation behind why I do it, and truthfully I think meaning in general is beyond the greatest force when it comes to feeling fulfilled and satisfied with your work. I’ve noticed that OCs that are made for the sake of “well, I should make one” tend not to feel very satisfying, or really have any qualities that feel special or impactful to the creator. You get this meaning, almost always, through inspiration.
There is no real thing as a purely original character, contrary to popular belief. Every character you see nowadays takes traits and attributes from other existing forms of media or real, existing things. By definition… they are “memes', even. Hell, characters you may expect to be purely original take inspiration from pre-existing things. Darth Vader’s design and concept, for example, was hugely inspired by the Japanese feudal era, and moreover, he is hugely rumored to have taken direct inspiration from Doctor Doom (seriously, look it up). In other words, it’s ok to take inspiration from pre-existing things and reimagine these concepts into their own entities. What you personally are inspired by leaves a distinctly individual mark on both the meaning and execution of your character. This kind of inspiration is really important because it is what defines the fulfillment and meaning of the process. Don’t let yourself get caught up in “oh you stole this and that from x character”; the only time this ever applies is if you stole the concept and execution verbatim which is an incredibly rare, subjective, and facetious thing to quantify.
In essence, the journey that leads to the final character tends to be the thing that defines the impact and fulfillment involved in creating and designing characters. Let yourself have fun; it’s ok to take inspiration from things and make the experience fun for yourself.
Advice #2: Be Deliberate
A very common mistake a lot of new creators tend to make is that, without really thinking much about it, they add a ton of things and bloat the content of the character without considering how different parts of the character interact with one another. To be deliberate, in essence, is to know what to apply to one character and what to save for another. Think of it like you’re making a team for your favorite Pokemon Showdown format; you want to ensure that parts of their character all work together to create a cohesive whole. You wouldn’t want to put an Unaware Quagsire on a Hyper Offense since it has little to no offensive presence and only exists to sap momentum, instead that’s something you would want to save for a Stall team to check setup wallbreakers. The same applies to OCs. Making a character a master sword fighter while also making them a dedicated mage, god, and pacifist that runs an animal-safety association are incredibly conflicting because they literally just do not work together unless you add a ton of complex strings to their backstory and history, which can make it really difficult to focus your inspiration and far easier to get overwhelmed in the long term.
Things like backstories, for example, can play heavily into the design of the character. Scars, clothing choices, personality, and vibes are all things that can be influenced by the backstory, and are even things that influence each other. It’s because of this that generally being consistent helps make your character feel more like a distinct, cohesive individual, and with it, you can focus your inspiration far better without feeling like you have to dance from detail to detail just to get everything you want in one character. Being deliberate, though, is adding as much as you feel is necessary toward building the whole of the character or how much you actually want to complete for them in the first place. It’s up to you to decide how much you add and what your limits are for the character; just be aware of those limitations in the first place, watch out for moments when you are getting overwhelmed fleshing them out, and know when to stop.
Advice #3: Make Mistakes
This sounds incredibly counter-intuitive, but to me it’s something that I think can be insanely valuable for beginners. Everybody starts out somewhere and, frankly, it’s not realistic to expect yourself to do everything perfectly and find your ideal imaginative process from the get go. Not only does that make the process not fun, but it also can lead to being overloaded and can defeat the point of making the character in the first place. This plays back into my first tip, where meaning and inspiration should be what drives the process as opposed to making a “perfect character” for the sake of making a “perfect character”, unless that’s what’s inspiring you.
I’m incredibly experienced and even I make a lot of mistakes. People who have known me for a long time know that I make a ton of bloated backstories and make a lot of questionable worldbuilding decisions. Without making those mistakes in the first place, I wouldn’t be able to really understand what makes the process tick for me and recognize my flaws without seeing them in execution. In fact, that is what helps you improve in the first place: retrospection is really powerful for anybody, including creators.
Remember, too, that you’re not locked into the character and details as soon as you “finalize” them. There is no such thing as finalizing a character. Sometimes, characters get completely reworked and go through the wringer numerous times before coming to a point where the creator is satisfied, and even then if the circumstances change, the character may experience even more change. The key thing to consider is that making mistakes is a perfectly normal part of the process and that making mistakes can retain your focus and, above all else, enjoy the process without overloading yourself.
DO
- Share your art of your Character(s)
- Share your fanart of yours or others' Character(s)
- Share your Characters' backstories when sharing art
- Share sketches of current Characters or Characters in progress
- Ask for critique or suggestions for Character concepts
DON'T
- Beg for collabs or for art to be made of your Character(s)
- If you want custom art of your Character(s), commission an artist directly! More info here
- Only share your Characters' Backstories; this is still an art-based thread!
- Only criticize someone's Character design; make sure your suggestion(s) and/or criticism(s) is/are CONSTRUCTIVE in nature
Index of Artists and their OCs can be found below:
