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Goth character drawing | Anima

A goth character drawing inspired by 00s alt and romantic goth culture, World of Darkness RPGs, ink, and tattoo designs. Thank you Rafael!

I worked with the client’s references and briefing to make a character anchored in the symbology, aesthetic and themes that had an important meaning for him. The idea was to cristalize those ideas into a single, ‘ideal’ character.

For this reason, this piece had many initial roughs and passes to test different poses, attires and poses for the Anima.
Commission style: Traditional-looking sketch
Software: Clip Studio Paint

Anima portrait

For her outfit I looked at 00s romantic goth fashion and iconic artists like Victoria Frances or even Ayami Kojima’s Castlevania illustrations. The overall mood and themes were also heavily inspired by Vampire: The Masquerade and oldschool book and TTRPG illustrations.

The finished artwork has minimal color shading and we went with a blue, purple, and red palette. To me these colors make me think of zines and even CRPG color palettes, such as the original Wizardry or new games like Moonring.

Black, blue, white and red sketch-style illustration of a slender pale woman in a night scene. She wears a purple cropped corset and skirt, has long black hair, and looks down at a wilted roses bouquet held against her chest. She walks above a red stream and there's a mausoleum and tombstones in a snowy field behind her. The sky is black, save for dead tree branches and a red waxing crescent moon.

Closeups

A close-up of the pale woman. Her black raven hair is spread by wind and rain, and she has thin, tribal black ink designs tattooed onto her arms and stomach. A red tear streams down her right eye as she looks down at the wilted flower bouquet.
Closeup of a pedestal with a gargoyle in front of the mausoleum door. It has dragon-like wings, horns and its mouth is open.

The gargoyle has a standard quadruped fantasy dragon look, but the head leans lightly towards a nordic dragon carving.

Process and initial tests

This would be a winter-y, desolate scene with rain, so we tested graveyard props, decaying statues, and ruins. Her initial outfit leaned more towards a barbarian-type character, so we rolled back to a more classic vampire, goth look.

Eight sketches of the pale woman wearing different kinds of goth-inspired outfits like corsets and skirts, and standing in front of gargoyles or wolf statues.
Different rough sketches of the pale woman wearing goth-inspired long, flow-y dark dresses, and posing with a sickle or a skull.
First stage. I tested different silhouettes and items, like the skull or sickle.

Goth Tattoo design

This character would have tattoos trailing up her arms and torso, so I made a separate file to experiment with the base design.

Rough tattoo sketch showing abstract tribal shapes that resemble tears, roses, thorns and wings.
The initial exploration had thorns and roses, and tribal, thicker lines.
Tribal, retro tattoo design showing abstract shapes that resemble wings and tears.
Then we funneled into more delicate lines, removing the roses while keeping the bat wings.

Print stores, support, and personal work

A drawing of a vampire kissing a woman. he wears a toreador outfit and has long curly black hair, while the woman has tied-back blond hair and wears a red blazer.

INPRNT has my overseas print store, while Patreon and Ko-fi have stock art and hi-res illustrations for supporters.

If my stores don’t have the artwork you’re interested in buying (and it isn’t client work!), shoot me a message!

🇧🇷 Brazil residents: I might be able to produce and send A4 and maybe A3 prints myself, message me if interested. 💌

More personal work: Writing, worldbuilding, and tutorial tags; plus freebies, live streams, and YouTube timelapses.

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