About Early Chapters
Cecily Stevens
I am senior at The Bronx High School of Science, and I live on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City. I've been drawing and taking art classes for years, but my primary artistic inspiration these days is the media I consume, from webcomics to novels. I also have many original characters, some even dating back to elementary school!
Making the Images
I like to work in both traditional and digital mediums. While most of the pieces I consider "finalized" are done digitally, I usually do preparatory sketches on paper. I find it's much easier to draw people dynamically and fluidly when I'm able to interact more tangibly with my medium.
​
I then scan these sketches into IbisPaintX, and do the line art, colors, and shading digitally. These steps are much easier digitally, where you have more room to correct flaws.
​
Ibis provides a vast array of digital brushes and editing tools that I often experiment with. This has led to a lovely variety, if not inconsistency, among my works. I lean towards bright colors and messier line art, as well as an anime-like style of caricature.
Homestuck
Homestuck is a webcomic that ran from 2009 to 2016. It's known for having an incomprehensible plot, childish art, colorful and beloved characters, and an incredibly passionate fanbase. To give a VERY truncated summary of the plot: a group of kids bring about the end of the world by playing a video game and embark on a quest to create a new world with the aid (and hinderance) of a group of trolls. And that doesn't NEARLY scratch the surface of what Homestuck is about.
​
Homestuck was my primary artistic inspiration from very late 2019 throughout most of 2020. I was especially taken with the characters of Rose Lalonde and Vriska Serket. Rose, especially, is a reoccurring character in my artwork even once I shifted my focus to other fandoms!
Dream SMP
The Dream SMP is a story acted live through livestreaming platforms like Twitch and YouTube, with the video game Minecraft as its medium. Livestreamed multiplayer servers had been done before, and to great success. The difference with DSMP is that it follows a loose script, and aims to convey a narrative, unlike the servers before it that mostly focused on comedic skits.
​
The DSMP was a massive phenomenon during the lockdown era, emerging with the surge in popularity of both Minecraft and livestreaming. DSMP streamers attracted millions of live viewers.
Genshin Impact
Genshin Impact is an open-world role-playing game developed by miHo Yo in China. I have to admit that I am not a big video game player but I was attracted by the rich back story and the glorious, anime-style art work. I have made several images based on characters and places in the Genshin world of Teyvat.
Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint
Omniscient Readers Viewpoint is a Korean webnovel written by Sing N Song. It features Kim Dokja, who is the only reader of a mysterious webnovel entitled 'Three Ways to Survive the Apocalypse'. The novel describes an apocalypse in which, supposedly mythical, creatures called the Dokkaebi take over the earth and turn it into a huge and cruel game.
​
On the very day that the last chapter of TWSA is published, the events described in the novel begin to unfold in Dokja's world. Dokjia must team up with the webnovel's protagonists to defeat the Dokkaebi and return the world to its rightful state.
Original Characters (OCs)
I enjoy dreaming up new worlds, imagining the forces that propel them: the economics, politics and religion.
Particularly interesting is how elements that do not exist in our world produce different outcomes. For example, what would happen if magic was part of everyday life. Or, the implications of magic being the domain of a small elite.
​
Of course I am interested in the individual people as well. I draw up character sheets that inevitably include pictures of my characters. There are several examples on this site.
Website
I built the website using WIX with some JavaScript to tune the pages as I wanted them. The only page that has any real brains beyond the WIX toolset is the Selected Images page. This page uses a data structure that contains the Chapters and the Images within them. This allows the display of the main image, the text and the related images. It supports switching images within the single page.
Thanks
I got a lot of help and feedback on the website from friends and family. Many thanks to: Lydia, Madeleine, Stella, Sam, Arthur, Oliver, Janet, Dan, Luke, Terri, Maddie, Derek, Amber, Igor, Joao, Mike, Lisa, Jonny and Doug (although he actually just suggested I take down most of the images).