Semeir's fanart spot!

[Semeir-Cooraf-Armaheen]

I've discovered I can mostly draw Andalites, at least portraits right now. Might expand later to draw full bodies as I figure out how to do it. I have no experience with art classes, so everything I draw I figured out on my own. I don't pretend to be Picasso or Michelangelo, but I think my fanart gets the idea across

Enjoy.

Semeir-Cooraf-Armaheen

Okay, Semeir takes me WAY back. She's my second-oldest OC of all the OC's I've created. Yes, her main eyes are huge. Her main eyes dominate her face. It's how I always pictured her, it's not an anime influence at all. Inspiration for her eyes comes from Patricia Tallman, an actress with large eyes. (She was Lyta Alexander on Babylon 5!)

Semeir wants to be a warrior. Her male peers mock her when she's younger because of her unusually large tailblade, her fascination with Earth fairy tales and her constant proclamations of someday becoming a warrior. She's not the first Andalite girl to dream this dream, but she won't be the last, either.

And someone believes she can make it, so he's been teaching her everything he knows. Sem fell in love with him the moment their eyes met. At first it was just an OMG he's so handsome!!!! crush, but it grew into real, genuine love as she spent more time around him. She hopes to gain the courage to tell him she loves him.

The name of that Andalite?

Elfangor.

I'm revamping Semeir's story because I feel nostalgic and I think she has a good tale to tell. What she starts as and where she ends is a monumental difference. There's a perfect spot in Animorphs canon where I can wedge in this fic and not break anything, so that's what I'm doing.

A Semeir moment:

There was a launch that day, but I had to miss it. I was stuck studying blades of grass with Veilla. We were out near the combat practice area, taking samples.

Veilla droned on, {The photosynthesis of red leads to...}

But I'd stopped listening.

With my talk eyes, I was watching Elfangor run in the field as he trained arisths in the art of fighting.

The way he curled his legs with every graceful running step. The streak of light that followed his tailblade when he snapped his tail during a spar. The ripple of his muscles when he ducked and countered an aristh's strike.

It made me feel like the Little Mermaid watching her human prince.

He was everything I wanted to become. So graceful. Strong. Powerful. Unstoppable.

{Semeir!} Veilla snapped.

I jolted to attention. {Yes, ma'am?}

The old female narrowed her main eyes at me. They were a dark bronze color and set wide apart on her dark violet face. She was probably beautiful once upon a time.

{Keep your eyes focused on your lesson.} She said. {You have no place among warriors. You are a female, you belong here with other females. Leave the males to fight our battles.}

{How can we make a difference when we waste our time staring at plants all day?}

That was the wrong thing to say to a passionate botanist, and I immediately regretted it. Plants made her happy, and I'd just insulted her passion far worse than she'd insulted mine.

I shut out most of her private thoughtspeak yelling, and after the session was over and the other females were dismissed, I received my punishment. Thanks to my terrible brain-to-thoughtspeak filter, I spent the afternoon writing a lengthy essay about the therant tree life cycle.

It took so long because the subject matter bored me to death. I probably fell asleep twice!

But when I finished and handed it in, I smugly noted it was my best writing yet. I guess I did absorb more than I thought.

Veilla let me go--finally--and I galloped into the field to search for my lost data pad, but I couldn't find it. All my hopes rested on someone finding it and sending it to my scoop.

I spent the remaining afternoon watching Elfangor run drills. There were other warriors, but he held my attention the most.

And once again, I forgot the time. How in yaolin does it slip by me so easily?



Elfangor!

He has sad eyes. That was intentional. What wasn't intentional was his stalk eyes ending up posed almost exactly like Semeir's. I cracked myself up when I noticed what I did.

A glimpse of a moment where Semeir sees that look on his face:

{We do terrible things in a war, Semeir. Terrible things. Alloran getting infested by a Yeerk was my fault.} He sighed. With my stalk eyes, I watched him hang his head and close his main eyes. He didn't seem to realize he said that out loud. If he did, he didn't care. {I condemned him to a fate worse than death. If we win this war, if Alloran is still alive at the end, the only thing I want to tell him is how sorry I am. I don't expect him to forgive me. I can't even forgive myself.}

{Elfangor--}

{What happened to your family wasn't your fault, Semeir.} He said each word like he knew how badly I'd beaten myself up about it. {Leehan was an accident. Learn from it. Learn from the mistakes you make in life. If you never remember anything I say to you, remember that. Please, Semeir, always learn.}

It wasn't like Elfangor to show such vulnerability. Usually, he had a quick word to make me feel better. The sudden confession stopped my blubbering. I felt like such a child, crying about a simple field scuffle when he'd seen so much worse. As a warrior, I would have to see far worse on a battlefield.

In this war, no one was innocent. Everybody made mistakes, everybody carried guilt--even the Andalite I looked up to.

{Semeir, everyone thinks I'm a great hero, but I ran away. I ran until I couldn't anymore. I started out like you--I was about your age--wanting to be a hero and fight the Yeerks, but a war is so much more. It devours life. It twists people. I'm a hero because the Ellimist had good timing. That's all.}

{So many people look up to you.} I said, surprised. How could he speak that way?

A shudder ran through him. I wouldn't have noticed if he wasn't hugging me right then. He whispered, {If they knew the truth you do...they wouldn't, Semeir.}

{I know the truth, and I look up to you.}

Elfangor smiled down at me. It was a pained smile, and I knew he was crying inside. He wasn't the type to let other people hear him cry. He'd seen and experienced things beyond explanation or understanding. Sometimes, he seemed ready to throw his fists in the air and scream.

I knew he wouldn't. That wasn't Elfangor's style.

He took all that pain, all that weight in his hearts, and transformed it into something positive.

{Someday, I think I'll be the one looking up to you,} he said.

I don't think he realized he gave himself away.

Everybody placed him up a pedestal. I know because I do, too. Except...the more I'm around him, the more I just see him as Elfangor, the Andalite who came to my rescue in more ways than one.

He is my hero for that alone.


Captain Rubliss-Tance-Nekklin

THOSE ARE NOT ACTUALLY EYEBROWS, it's just fur going tan with age. His just happens to LOOK like bushy eyebrows since he doesn't trim it XD Also, I fail at foreshortening.

Does he remind you of Mr. Tumnus from Narnia a bit? =p Good, that's where I got the inspiration for Rubliss' look. Rubliss is that REALLY COOL OLD DUDE who doesn't treat young arisths like dung stuck to his hooves. He's also quite shrewd when it comes to judging a person's character and motives. He figures out Semeir has a crush on Elfangor in .000001 seconds, teases her a bit and then tells her he won't spread her little secret.

But don't ever piss him off. He might be on the small side, but he can intimidate you into feeling two feet tall. His thoughtspeak voice would be the same voice Peter Cullen uses for Optimus Prime, and you forget how scrawny he is when he goes into Captain Boss Mode. He's not a ship's captain for scrubbing toilets.

This is how Semeir describes him:

And I thought all captains were the same: old, nasty and ready to stomp everyone who crossed their paths.

But Rubliss was different. I could tell he was pretty old, but he wasn't particularly large and didn't look as imposing as the warriors all around. I might have mistaken him for an aristh if it weren't for the way he held his tail. His narrow main eyes were pale green while his stalk eyes shone as dark as grass--a rare mix of genetics giving him eye colors from both parents.


And when she sees him again years later:

{Semeir!} Rubliss cantered towards me, surprised to see me there. {I almost didn't recognize you. You've grown up since I last saw you up close.}

I peered at him. A faint new scar roughened the fur near his right eye. He'd developed tan fur on the very tips of his ears, above his main eyes and on his chin. Males usually clipped the tufts on their ears short. In fact, he was the only Andalite I knew who wore the shaggy-eared style.

Rubliss still looked quite distinguished and attractive despite being old enough to be my grandfather. Not every male Andalite had the luxury of aging so well.

{So have you,} I remarked, which caused his stalk eyes to smile in amusement.

{I've always looked young for my age.} Rubliss' smile flashed brighter, but didn't last.



There ya go.

[Myitt]

Very nice!  Kind of strange to see the non-eyebrows and the "beard" on an aging Andalite...wouldn't the rest of him be going tan, as well?  Why specifically a beard and eyebrow area of tan hair?  They don't appear to have much facial hair in the book illustrations.  But overall, well done Semeir!   Yay, thanks for sharing your work!

[Semeir-Cooraf-Armaheen]

I kind of think they have style choices there just like we have fashion trends here. Rubliss is just lucky in he's tanning the way he is(ya know, like some people gray in a cool streak), rather than just salt/pepper He'd be getting the patches of tan all over in the next few years. It's just starting on his chin and forehead and ears. He is also a terrible flirt, though you don't see that in the story. Females just laugh because he's the equivalent of a human hitting 70--he's not a spring chicken. ^^

And Rubliss looks that way because there's a book where Ax is using his tailblade to shave Tobias(in Ax morph) to make them look less identical. The unschweet thing, where Ax remarks that it's the only way he knows how to cut fur.

That tells me that Andalites have style choices in how they look.

Some of the males I describe as letting the fur grow long over their hooves like Clydesdale horses, while others trim it(Semeir sees Elfangor trimming his at one point since he likes to keep it short and neat). Some might let their fur grow long(I picture Gafinilan as being a little shaggy) and others might keep it super duper short.

One fun thing about the books is KA never really described individual Andalites much, save for Mertil and Gaffy. In another book there was an Andalite with only one stalk eye. We know Elfangor has glittery green eyes.

That leaves a lot to play with regarding individual looks.

[Myitt]

Sure, individuality makes sense, but we do have the pictures of...pretty barren Andalite faces x3  Ah well.  Nice work, I'd love to see more!

[Semeir-Cooraf-Armaheen]

I need to know who I'm drawing XD It's easier to make them individual. I used the inner flap of the AC(my sig pic) for Elfangor to get the purple on him right.

I'm definitely sure their face shapes and eye colors vary a lot at the least.


I do the same thing when I draw Nameks. Their ear shapes, eye shapes, face shapes, antennae, sometimes even their eye color and shades of green vary. <3

Thanks!

I'll post more art in this thread when I draw more.