For the curious, here's a bit of background on the creation of the characters that are and will be featured in Deviant Paradigm.

Av is, unsurprisingly, something of an idealized form of myself. In actuality, his callsign of Avatar is a reference to Ultima, not to the fact that he is my representation. That use of the word is a fortitous coincidence. What I find really fascinating is how little Av is idealized from myself, at least in a physical nature. Most idealized forms that people draw and put online look very different from themselves. Av is me, but if I worked out. His fighting style is based on the fighting style used by Christopher Lambert in Beowulf (which I must recommend. It's a great movie, so long as you don't mind that the only things it bears in common with the actual epic is character names and a very vague semblence of plot).

Dawn is based on what I found attractive in high school, as that is when she originates. She was very much what I considered a perfect woman to be like. In many ways, Dawn is still an ideal of what I am attracted to, even the scar down the side of her face (which she tries to keep hidden). As I say (and Av will), I tend to see "pretty" in perfection, but true beauty lies in the tiny imperfections that make us human. Dawn is vaguely modeled after a girl from high school, and my leaving that behind is part of the reason that she is not dating Av anymore (that and when I suddenly became a fanboy my little universe got some bleed over).

C.C. is from an old Runza ad, as I recall. You'll forgive me if my memory is a bit fuzzy, C.C. dates from when I was about five years old. His name is trite precisely because he comes from then, which is why I abbreviate it (also I don't like saying things all the way out and like shortening them to initials -- it's an engineer thing). I can't explain exactly why he decided to go into medicine, he just did. C.C. has always been with Av, one of those steadfast friend characters, even before Av was Av (I've always fancied a doctorate, so he called him "Doc", though whether I end up with one or not is up for debate right now).

Luke and Jonathan are adaptations of my friends Luke and Jonathan, who demanded that they be put into my comic. As such, they are the hardest to write for, since they aren't my own, original characters. They're much like themselves in life, but with certain traits amplified. For example, Luke won't actually do anything to make a buck, but making him out to be a money-grubbing bastard was designed to make him more humorous and explain why he bothers to mess around with the rest of the Crew. Jonathan has similar reasons for being the way he is.

Watching Monkeybone again today reminded that Aya is rather in the style of Miss Kitty from that movie, a character that's a big part of why I like the it (much of the humor being a bit crude for my tastes). Aya also bears some stylistic influence from Kitty from Under Power. Those were the influences that I brought, at least, into her creation. I actually can't claim full responsibility for Aya, though. Aya owes a lot to Sapph's envisioning of her. I've got a lovely bit of "pre-fan art" that I'll put up once she's formally introduced. That would be the first sketch that would become what she is now, after I adapted it for my own purposes. She's also been guided into being by all the anime I've watched in the past and my own personal preferences.

Sapph and Mal (the boyfriend) will also be appearing for certain. Sapph appears as an idealized form of himself as well, albeit one twisted by his own fetishes. (Quit looking at me like that. I didn't say there was anything wrong with it, just that it was done.) Mal is far less idealized. While I haven't gotten to write much with him in it, he's going to pretty much just be the furry version of himself, I suspect. Mal has worked as my weirdness filter for a few years now, pretty much ever since I met him Freshman year, so he really doesn't need to have a personality tweaked for the bizarre.

Well, that's it for now. I'll try to fill in some of the little inspirations and backgrounds on some of the other characters later, if I remember, but that's a lot of text to digest right up there.

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