Slavs and Eastern Europeans are rarely subjects of mainstream media and when we are, we are reduced to thugs, mafia members, prostitutes and other negative roles. It wasn't until I started communicating with people from all over the world when I found out that these stereotypes that we would laugh about ourselves, were believed to be how we actually behave. And while I do not deny that such people indeed exist among us, most of us are normal working people, who try to live our lives with dignity. But the fact that these people are ignored, our culture and folklore remain unknown and unexplored by people.

When I first started writing "Daystar" back in the early 2010s, it was your generic fantasy series, that you've already seen. But, growing up with our traditional fairy tales I would find myself borrowing from them more and more. This, alongside the stated above, made me shift the narrative, names and lore to Slavic inspired. And while I understand I will never be able to capture all of the cultures of each and every Slavic country, I will try to do my best at presenting the essences of it.

I have written most of it by hand and currently, I am transferring it on my laptop it, as well s translating it to English. There is nothing wrong with mainstream fantasy, in fact, it is what made me write in the first place, but my story never felt original until I changed the inspiration. The word for 'witch" is derived from the verb"to be capable" was the finale piece and from then some characters went a full 180 degrees transformation.

having this story just lying there wasn't enough for me, so I finally decided to share it with the world. Being well received is not my main driving force. It is the idea to share something, for it to reach people, to inspire people to open up and want to learn something more - just like many of my favourite story had me.

Girl your story of your life is crazy, sometimes I would like to think that everything you do in life puts you where you are now whether it will be good or bad, so reading your story to me its like you have to gone thru things to come to a realization and such, like how you went thru cancer ( sorry if it doesn't make sense, or its a little off, I'm trying to find the right words to put it in)

The origin of what had brought me into writing and who I am now is still in the "making" because I am still young ( like in my teenage years) but it would have to be my fothor and people on the internet but mainly him, and I guess his teachings had got to me which had led me into thinking that there should be more Poc people like with you had said you wanted to see more of them, ( I don't like using POC because to me it sounds weird but in this case I'll use it) and other cultures that aren't often seen in stories, maybe there is but it is hard to find them. So that had led me into creating stories

(Don't mind the cover and the background I'm in the making of the cover currently 🏽)

Also I hope you have a fine day

Thank you!

As a Mix person the labels are always confusing to me and I would like to blame America for that because they like to put people into category based upon their skin and their ancestry ( but mainly by the skin)

I also wish the path that you are going into will be excellent :

I wanted to tell a fanfic story but i don't really consider myself a writer, as that would require writing about the character's inner thoughts and emotions that I don't feel quite adequate at expressing (unless it's them brooding about being Not Enough) so I went with a comic.

now I'm going through a period of feeling like my story doesn't matter as it's a fan story for a game whose fandom p much pushed me out...

on a more positive note, I just wanted to show the obscure characters I like some love.

I understand that scare to a personal level (I can't hardly type that word without feeling uncomfortable, sorry ). It is great that it can make yourself push for the better.

It was all started by an impressionable kid watching Naruto. At that moment it came into my mind: "I want to make something like this." I wanted to make an impactful and inspiring series for people to look up and take comfort in. I thought and still think that it must be good to tell your own story; to be seen and heard.

It was actually planned for a comic as at that moment I started to learn drawing manga. Yet, I come into term with the lack of my technical and drawing skills. I made some scripts and storyboard in case of my drawing getting better (dream on, loser!), but I am always abandoning it. For now, it is written in novel form.

The series has been in development for more than five years, and the concept has been drastically changed since its creation. It probably reflects the changes in my mindset and the media I consume. The story started as your average shōnen "save-the-day-with-the-power-of-friendship," to whatever the fuck is this shit right now.

I am not a dreamer, I am not moralistic, I am not informative. My current story is not to tell hope and positivity, or guide readers on the right paths, or inform people about unknown things. For me it is like a collection of thoughts, imagination and reality I have seen, and most of all emotions I will never be able to express being retold in another way.

Maybe in the end, I am still the same: wanting to be seen and heard.

Seeing a pattern in this thread with wanting to represent the background you all came from. I wish I started with a similar reason XD

I drew and wrote a lot growing up, but I had one big catalyst for my current work. During middle school, I read a series called Wings of Fire, where all the characters are dragons. That inspired me to start writing a novel series of my own, Night Riders, also about a world run by dragons. This was my first “serious” project. The general conceit hasn’t changed much—Wither, a dragon from a secret society, runs away and tries to live in a world he’s never been in.
I made the cover with some cheap colored pencils my mom got for me that Christmas. I drafted every chapter in MS Word docs on a laptop that I later broke. They’re all gone

Before that, I posted what I wrote on Wattpad, and I made a lot of friends that I still talk to today! I never finished even the first book of that series. I rebooted it into a new novel a couple years later. I still liked the general conceit, and I wanted to put them in a (not much) better thought out world and plot. I was also posting my art on WP at the time. That’s when I realized how much I drew my characters. Maybe it’d be more fun if I made a comic so I can write this story and draw my characters?

So I did! It’s a story I’ve been trying to tell in some way or another for years. Barring any unforeseen catastrophe, I believe I have the scheduling, planning, skills, and passion to actually get it done this time.

I found the first manga to read at a library and since that day I've been inspired!

It all started with me wanting to make comics SO badly. I think I started drawing the first few in middle school... I only drew them for myself and never shared them, haha...
2014 I won a character design contest of one of Germany's biggest conventions and happy with the feedback I started building a comic story around her! Until some really, really mean "friends" made fun of it infront of their +500 followers on Twitter.
I still don't feel comfortable sharing my work anywhere, but my passion for telling stories is too strong to let it stop me. I'm just more "careful" with sharing it, I guess.
Anyway- the same convention announced in 2017 that they will take in EVERY artist so I picked up working on comics again: This time a story of two siblings I've been planning in my head for about 5 years at that point. It was my first (and so far only) printed work and it sold pretty well at the convention!

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After I was done with telling their story in two parts I felt kind of empty, like I was missing something...
Therefore I decided to pick up a new project: Hexenhammer.
The story started with a few designs I did for fun, making them actual characters and connecting them more and more. I always knew that I wanted to turn it into a story (game or comic!) so I didn't spoil much.
The story itself started in 2013 but the comic around 2018. In the year 2021 I am still working on it any enjoying it more and more~

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If you are curious about it now, you can check it out here!

For my first comic work- I still need a place I can sell it on, since I can't give something that was expensive to print and that many people bought so far away for free

Well, Nova and Max being my first actual comic that I showed my mom like a week ago... Even though, it's been on Tapas for about two years... The characters, themselves make appearances in my other work. The comic ended on a sweet note, thanks to @amortelito.

Side Note: I am also black. My main characters are usually female. The one time I wrote from a guy's perspective, my highschool teacher freaked out, and pulled me aside asking if I was gay. That was about 11 years ago and I still haven't tried writing from a male's pov, since.

Back in 2002ish when I was 12 or 13, I grabbed a copy of RPG Maker for PS1 hoping to make a Zelda game (that idea was scrapped VERY quickly lmao). I wanted to make something original, but I had no idea what. This was around the time Tenchi Muyo started airing on Toonami, and their take on space pirates was pretty cool. Saiyans that could make lightsabers manifest in their hands, I mean come on what geeky kid that grew up in the 90s WOULDNT be into that? So I took my own spin on it and made "Space Pirate", the absolute worst piece of trash I have ever created. Somehow I pushed through and made 3 games and then shelved it once high school started.

About 3 years ago, I had the idea of reviving it. Now being a software engineer, I could actually pull off a proper game. Reworked the story, fixed all the stupid shit, and overall cleaned up the mess. Only one problem..nothing on this project was getting done lol. Trying to come down on an art style, figuring out the feel of the music, etc. It just wasn't moving. So I scrapped the game and turned it into a manga instead. And now here we are 12 episodes later:

@Lady_T_Musings Oh wow! You went through some hardship for sure. I'm glad that you were able to pull through it all. I find the backstory on how and why you made your comic is very interesting. I just opened up a new tab and I'm looking forward to reading it.

@enoshiwa If you do have your print version. Have you ever though about going to a local store and see if they're willing to sell it through consignment?

My comic started back in High School as well. A lot of my friends were creating their own stories/artwork and preparing to turn it into a comic book. I was going through a lot of hardship in my teenage years and needed to release some of my pain. I heard writing was a great way to do that, so I started writing a journal. However, it soon morphed into a fantasy/adventure story about me and my current friends battling the forces of evil. I was obsessed with Sailor Moon and Buffy the Vampire Slayer at the time. I decided to make my story into a comic book, get it printed and sell it in stores.

I wanted it to stand out from the rest, so I incorporated all the things I never truly understood about the shows that I loved. Why is there a battle in every single episode? Why do characters automatically know how to use their new found abilities like pros? Why do characters suddenly change from scaredy-cats to tough agile warriors when in battle? Why is the adventure so straight-forward? Why do they make villains so obvious? Where's the mystery in the adventure?

Fast forward 6 years and it's been 5 years since I stopped drawing the comic (my art style was changing too much) and I've now edited my story at least 3-4 times since animation school. I felt like it was the time to start the new version of my comic. I reached out to my Myriam (character in the story), so she could read the draft and as feedback, she told me the story was weirdly paced and there were story gaps in the everywhere. So, I decided to scrap it again and start over.

Fast forward 2 years and it's a good to go according to Myriam. So, I sat down to start doing my comic again. I was pretty rusty after developing carpal tunnel syndrome (couldn't draw for 10 months) and suffering from depression from working as an animator to working in a call center. Stupid economy crisis of 2008! During that time, I became very aware of how unpopular I was on Deviantart and it bothered me. I became self-conscious on my own work and it affected me quite a bit. I became so focused on pleasing others, that the style wasn't my own and I was very slow and inconsistent. One page took me a month! I learned that you should never pay attention to numbers and definitely never succumb to the pressure of what's trendy. Always create for yourself. You'll get a lot more enjoyment doing it, your true skills will emerge and you'll also work a lot faster.

It was a real turning point for me as a artist/writer. I threw the scripts in the garbage. All 250 pages of it. I grabbed the unfinished sketchbook, which had the original comic i started in high school and started to draw in it. I wanted to kill everything that came before it and drawing in that book did the job. I was going to put in the extra effort and do it my way! I reached out to all of my high school friends who were featured in the story and asked if I could still use their name and their looks for the characters, warning them that I was scraping everything and making drastic changes in all the characters and storyline. Surprisingly, they still all agreed. And I also removed myself as character from the story.

It took for 4 years and it was well worth it! The script was solid and the the artwork is mine. I got the 1st comic book printed (cost a fortune, it's a coloured comic!) It didn't sell well and it bummed me out. But, I didn't give up and a year later, I released my 2nd comic. It did well. With the exception of 2020, I've released a book every year.

In 2019 though, a reader went on Facebook and asked the local comic book store if they carried my series. They didn't, but said they'd be interested. I jumped in the car right away and drove over. I now sell the comic series at 3 different stores in the province of New Brunswick. And at conventions, I sell more comics than anything else on my table, I don't mind it a bit.

I didn't mean to write so much about the origins and how I got where I am now, but I guess if you've been doing it for 20 years, it's hard to keep it short.

Oh dear...

Well, I had this short story
https://tapas.io/episode/1819965
I wanted to turn into a short 20-40 pages comic but I decided to expand the part about Elie's and Rikter's childhood and everything went downhill from there.
Six and a half years later my comic (Gifts of wandering ice) is currently on page 662...

Your story is really inspiring. Like...taking advantage of the time we have, it's something I forget about sometimes.

For me, I grew up in a very Math/Science school system that was like...it was intense. Like anime level intense. Which was great for a lot of things, I don't want to make it seem like I regret opportunities that I had, but it was really terrible for our mental health and everyone I know from my school has had to go through therapy because of it (if they could afford it). Like part of the reason I am an artist is because of a lash back to the way I grew up. Anyway, that experience lead to the story I'm posting right now.

Like it's a fantasy about magic kids who are bad at school, but it's also a discussion about the expectations we put on children and the expectations we put on ourselves when we are children--those expectations are pretty harmful stuff--and those same expectations we are quick to disparage in schools are still very common in YA novels. So the story I wrote is about those YA tropes, and these kids making an attempt to change their fate--if that's even possible--and figuring out who they are when everyone else is telling them something different.

It was a novel, then I decided it was the wrong length for publishing, then I made it a comic, and then I decided to change the entire ending and now it's a novel again (although the comic has one more post here on tapas before I put it back on the shelf)

Origin:
I was raised by some super extremely religious people who homeschooled, homechurch, and cut me off from society. I didnt have friends and wasnt allowed to access most modern media (absolutely no modern music. Most TV and music was off limits.) Even with the homeschooling I didnt always have access to real material because my parents didnt really believe women needed an education. And felt college was a waste of money.
The only thing I was given access to was the internet because my parents didnt really know enough about tech to know they would have wanted to censor that. I met a ton of people online who taught me about the world. And I was convinced I wanted more from my life. I mostly met artists and I wanted to be just like them.

My parents had told me my whole life I had no talent so I had never tried to draw but the people online had told me if I worked hard I could be good at it. So I did.
They also encouraged me to study with my access to the library and I was able to get a decent score on the ACT. Get into college. And escape the life that was planned for me.

I'm now disowned by my family, but Im free, I've become a professional designer for a children's publishing company. Have my own house, and car. I'm learning programming. And I'm also starting to work on some concepts for a comic

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Thank you, I'm super happy to hear of your triumphs too. I know you overcame a lot also. And I love the representation in your art. You are so right about the importance of it. I teach art at a local college sometimes and one of the projects we did was animating poetry by young Black girls from our community to amplify their voices and increase their media representation. We brought in diversity and representation advocates (who were people of color) to advise us on proper representation (since we were majority white people and didnt want to mess it up. Especially for a bunch of kids). Listening to the advocates was really eye opening and changed how most of us view media. So I just wanted to say your project is really cool, and I loved how you wanted to see it, so you literally made it happen.