Kelpie Character Design - Tumblr Posts

Remember how I said I had Faas sketches. Well now I have a rendered and colored Faas drawing. Aren’t I fancy-

But ye, here he is with enya. He isn’t actually grumpy, he just doesn’t visually emote very much for trauma and autism reasons. I forgot to mention that Enya is a kelpie. The story takes place, as mentioned earlier, in Pennsylvania, (which had and has one of the highest Irish population densities in the US) so I was thinking that maybe kelpies were an “invasive species” since they can be dangerous and belong to the unseelie quart, and can be killed without any punishment. Enya’s mother was murdered when she was twenty months old.

Due to the traditional horse like appearance of kepies, she has horizontal pupils, (but golden eyes sort of like a frog. actually playing around with kelpies having a pollywog stage between birth, or maybe hatching, and 12-18 months. still up in the air tho) and horse legs and ears. She has fins as her ‘hair’ and tail tho.

Up until puberty hits, kelpies are physically unable to show anyone their true form, sort of like the way fawns don’t have a scent for the fist few days after birth, for safety reasons.

However Faas can see her true form because in many troll folklore, they are immune to certain types of magic, especially of the concealitory (apparently that isn’t a word but I don’t care) variety. Kelpies aren’t true shape shifters like changelings, the mask you see is nothing more than a shield of magic that tricks your brain into seeing a human, while they are still green and horsey underneath the whole time. This magic also effects photos, drawings, and mirrors and is especially strong when the person is young.

Anyway, yeah. You’re welcome for the ramble that no one asked for

I am so, so happy with how this turned out, I just- *vibrates* it’s been so long since I’ve done a full page

I sketched Enya’s new design a few months ago on what was planned to be a junk page because marker had bled through from the other side, but then I really liked it and I had a few new design ideas for Faas, so I drew him too, and then I realized I had enough space for Mable and-

So I colored them all and drew on random scraps of paper to glue on top of the marker bleeds. I don’t know why I’m so happy with it, but it’s one of my favorite art pieces in a while because usually I’m not particularly spontaneous, but things happened, so.

This was the traditional drawing I was referring to about Mable’s hair texture. This is what it’s supposed to look like. Also I’m still trying to decide whether it translates that she’s wearing tights, I feel like it sort of does, but idk.

This was originally a doodle I did during church with no pose reference (which, I’d like to add, I’m very proud of because it’s a weird perspective and it’s two people interacting and it actually turned out alright for once) and decided I really liked it, so I colored it.

And then proceeded to realize it reminded me a lot of this drawing I did two years ago, and it made me happy cuz I feel like I’ve actually improved which is nice.

Anyway. Yeah. My scrunklies which I love very much. Working on filling the rest of the page they’re on now.

Finally got around to painting this concept I’ve had floating around for a few months. This is Enya’s mom, Briony. (Above the water is her human form, below the water is her true form) Honestly really happy with how it turned out, especially since I haven’t properly water colored in about a million years, but yeah. Here she is.

Also, here’s where you can find her playlist and moodboard (just really like her playlist and everything I’ve scrounged up for it)