my polarityduo designs & process

creation date: sept 4

(more artwork is further down the page but you HAVE to let me yap a bit)

i did not forsee myself becoming unbearably obsessed with state after watching 2.5. my original intention was to create a small polarityduo-themed illustration series consisting of 5 drawings (3 of which were actually completed here, here, and here) and then leave it at that. but alas, things turned out different and i made a LOT more :D

anyhow, before i got started on any illusts, i first needed to create my own designs for them, which actually gave me a lot of grief. because what followed was the very classic artists' dilemma of: "i know exactly what this looks like in my head but it looks so wrong when i put it on paper." i'm telling you i redid each of their reference sheets TWICE.

discord screenshot of myself speaking, captioned: 'character design is beating my ass i thought i'd be pushing them out rapidfire but i can't come up with a saparata costume i like. he's a mouse. he has big comfy jacket. now what'

screenshot of the ibispaint artwork gallery with the timestamp of both reference sheets totaling to 81 hours and 41 minutes

guys be honest am i washed 💔

OK enough yapping here are their ref sheets

character reference sheet of saparata. he has curly light beige-white hair to his neck, and dons a mouse mask which covers half his face. he also has a white buttoned cloak slung loosely over his shoulders and underneath he wears a black turtleneck and wide palazzo pants with a strip of fabric tying them up. he also wears open toe open heeled compression socks. a blueprint holder is strapped over his chest. to the right of this artwork is his alternative 'fugitive' outfit which features him in a knit winter jacket, fur-lined torn cloak, and baggy black pants.

character featured: saparata (state 2.5)

i feel a bit complicated abt saps' design, it was honestly p rushed in comparison to flux's. i'm proud of everything above the shoulders and i like the general silhouette, but i just did NAWT know what to do with his damn cloak... i knew i definitely wanted him to have one with a hood, but i was also very insistent that he'd have a blueprint holder slung over a shoulder... which looks kinda cluttered with a hood. i don't like how un-intuitive it is but for the time being i'm keeping it. the mouse mask is also of mild contention, i want to change its shape to something more eerie - i made it too cartoony i think. if we're looking at the bigger picture though i think it overall captures my view of his character pretty sincerely. a lanky, goofy, chillgoing and free-spirited kinda guy. i made him too gd cute pfft... i don't know if i like it or not.

addressing the very obvious design tidbits: they have assigned animal motifs! i got the idea from saps' mc skin - i was a dumbass and didn't realize the pixels on his face made a smile and interpreted it as a snout at first. the mouse idea came from there initially, where i was flipflopping between "ferret" and "mouse" before i realized something: saps being the mouse to flux's roach works nicely as two "pest" animals hated by everyone. at at opposite points of the story, each person held that role. u got to admit that is kinda peak. i also imagine their animal motifs to change with every season. ~~2.7 saps is very snow hare-coded to me and 2.7 flux is a raven. 2.0 theria trio are all different types of owls with saps being a barn owl!~~ neither of them are actual animal hybrids unfortunately. even thou i loveeee that trope to death i wanted a kind of grounded interpretation of state's setting.

more trivia/headcanon for saps' design

all of his clothes are very loose on him, even the turtleneck is mildly oversized if you look at the sleeves. it felt like the best way to hammer home the easygoing vibe was to show that he dgaf if nothing fits him. the cloak is primarily to establish the “hermit” look while the open-toed shoes and big pants make him still seem active/agile :] meanwhile, his fugitive outfit is much more tight, bulky, and restrictive, removing all the once carefree elements.

my headcanon is that he stole all of those winter clothes whilst on the run.

he's wearing a bunch of pouches which store his blueprints/architectural stuff and/or meeting notes/letters :] once again, the harness is too big for him lol.
i have a headcanon that he keeps finding four-leaf clovers and so puts them on his mask/behind his ear whenever he finds them. he's just a lucky guy :]]]

character reference sheet of fluixon, a regal-looking man with spiky black hair and a sharp glare. he has a gold-studded black cape-jacket which drapes down to his feet and makes the shape of two insect wings. he has medieval-style purple paned sleeves atop a white dress shirt and cravat, and a matching purple corset. to the right of the artwork is his secondary outfit in which he's wearing midnight-blue armor (chestplate, gloves, thigh-high boots) with turquoise embellishments, and a horned crown.

character featured: fluixon (state 2.5)

flux was not any easier to design btw. maybe it took so long bcs his paned sleeves were the first thing i came up with and was so stubborn in keeping them even if they clashed with the ideas i was coming up with. so i was essentially creating a whole design off of big poofy sleeves instead of starting with the bigger picture lol... not the best technique. additionally while drafting, i was interpreting his mc skin's jacket as really thin and rectangular which i could not make look good no matter how hard i tried. the fact that it had no sleeves but a small cape that wrapped around his shoulders was also a head scratcher. then i had a the most intense eureka moment - cape jacket in the shape of wings, OF COURSE, he's a ROACH. it's so simple but i'm genuinely so proud of this silhouette & design when at the beginning, i was contemplating not making a design for him at all bcs of how much of a headache it gave me 😭

oh yeah, me bragging abt being proud of his design does NOT apply to his conspiracy arc design. it was SO HARD to incorporate the silence armor trim into flux' purple/yellow color palette. 100% skill issue on my part, i was banging my head against a wall trying to make turquoise blue look good with deep violet. fuuuuckkkk and i'm still not happy with it. the armor looks much much better with the jacket off, you'll see later trust me i'm not a fraud pleeeeaaaseeee.

more trivia/headcanon for flux's design

he has a roach motif because HE JUST WON'T DIE LOL. i think flux as a character would haaate being associated with a roach considering how uptight he is which makes it even more fitting to me - it's like the world is mocking him. i like to think flux's roach antennae are lil cowlicks that always come back no matter how much he cuts or combs it down pfft...
lots of upside-down heart/spade shapes repeated in his design, seen in his jacket, in his bangs, and on his collar. once again because of the roach motif
i chose to interpret the gray patch on his mc skin's left hand as a prosthetic. i don't have a headcanon as to how he lost his hand, but i do imagine that him joining luminara and becoming fond enough of it to join its govt started bcs he got his prosthetics custom made there and they were the ONLY ones to get him truly right :]. due to their reputation as "the light of island 2" or whatever, i'd imagine they're really good w that stuff.
also this is him without the jacket. he's rocking a bolero and corset combo lol. the white ruffled tie is covering the bolero's collar, it does have one.

ok ok ok. other than the fact that half of my commentary here is me trying to justify my fumbles, i hope u can understand my vision. thank you for reading, sincerely. this was a lot LOL and i got a LOT more up my sleeve.