Character Collection #3: Neura

Jun 1

✹ Part of the Character Collection series

Neura is odd in that she began as a 3D sculpting experiment. I’d been playing with Sculptris for a while but she was my first attempt as combining multiple spheres to make a single figure. I’d have kept going with the rest of her, but Sculptris is free and has a hard limit on the complexity of a figure before it crashes on you.

I wanted to make a character that was very typically my style and, big surprise, ended up drawing her over and over again. From the very beginning the shoulder pads made me think of her as this big athlete, so I leaned into it with the rest of her outfit. A few months later I thought of giving her a sword and it all began to click in my head. While I don’t have a project or story for her yet, I think of her as this aggressive sword-wielder who moves like an American football player. I don’t know where the name came from, but it sounded cool. With a name like Neura you’d think she’s a telepath or something but I don’t know if that fits. She’s definitely a loud talker though.

The last image up there was inspired by Dragon’s Lair. I wanted to push her a little further into sword & sorcery, while ensuring that her outfit stay contemporary. When I was a kid my favorite sweater featured an extreme skater kid with the words ZELDA’S REVENGE scratched above them. To this day I have no idea what that was (it’s not a Legend of Zelda thing), but it inspired the title of this fake game. Also, Grendel is the name of a cobbled together video game system my friend Mike made for his kids.

A bonus thought:
Live action movie Neura would be a buff purple Jessica Biel with a prosthetic nose bump/shoulders and a wig. Trick camera angles would make her look about 6’5”.

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I’ve been listening to La Bien Querida’s Brujeria a lot lately.

p.s.