When it's Victorian England but everyone has emo hair! Argh!
I am with you. I love overly complex, unbelievable clothing designs on characters purely because it steps so far away from what you'd expect of people in this world -- it's a lot of fun! More lively, more crazy. AND I ALSO have a story with a pink-haired girl as one of the main characters! It's a point of ridicule for her in her world, too, so... it might be entertaining for anyone who dislikes that trope, hahah^^
Personally, I want to say I hate eye patches but I've actually warmed up to a few characters with them. It's so commonly used but hey, I've seen it can be done without being too kitschy.
I wouldn't say I have real pet peeves when it comes to character design, but I will say I have a hard time relating to the main characters in a lot of gag/slice of life comics when they're drawn as really simplistic. The ones that look like the author are fine, but when it's like just a white blobby person with a smiley face I tune out.
I hate seeing cat girls that have cat ears on the top of their heads but also have human ears!
It's like WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! The poor thing is already a freak of nature!
It's not about being realistic or not - I mean go to my Lightfall or my Worldbuilding "sketchbook"and have a look at my characters. Realism? Nah, realism isn't my strong side either. It's about overuse of a certain colour. Speaking of yin-yang - I only don't like when people confuse yin with yang and that's all.
But yes, in general - I saw your comic and I will be honest - it's not my cup of tea, though, I don't hate it either.
Characters with heterochromia. Especially if the two different eye colours are wacky like one pink eye and one yellow eye or something :u I know people CAN actually have heterochromia, but when I see it in character design it's usually on cliche anime characters in a cheap way to make them unique.
Also rainbow anything. Rainbow hair, rainbow clothes, rainbow fur... plz no rainbow characters ;_; especially not with neon and angel/devil wings tacked on for extra-special-snowflakeness.
Basically, any character where their most unique attribute is their zany design and not their actual personality/character.
@Savannah - I'm under impression that people keep forgetting about it and just keep adding these human ears.
@alaingrey - bonus points if it's emo hair + insane giant ringlets combo.
No worries, not every comic can fit everyone's tastes, so it's understandable. I just looked into your stuff too, and it's not really my cup of tea either (although I will say on some of your environmental pictures, your colouring is flat-out stunning).
But yes, if we see the same things and patterns too much (such as my hot headed/cool headed character reference), we do tend to want to avoid them. I've personally never been bothered by a single hair colour choice though. I find that pretty much every colour in the spectrum has been used on characters in all of the media I consume, so I'm kind of desensitized to it.
@Michelle - Haha, I know I'm really putting myself out there by putting my characters with a bullseye on them for other posters here, but I have a gruff, grumbly military sergeant character with rainbow hair and rainbow powers. Painbow is his name. Although to be fair, as I've stated in that thread about why we design our characters the way we do, I originally came up with ridiculous character designs and concepts, and over time, I started to expand on them with personalities and character development that I can really get behind.
Haha, I had a "cat boy" character in an old comic, and I made a short joke comic about what was under his hair (did he have human ears AND cat ears, or was it just nothing where the human ears whould sit?). I think it ended up with the cat boy lifting up his hair for another character to see, and what they saw, they couldn't unsee...;)
Well, good for you then - I wish I wouldn't cringe every time I see one of these but nope. My brain seemingly can't handle it for some reason.
@CelestialNavigator - Hey, if it bothers you enough to make your own thread about it, who am I to argue?
@Greg_Dickson I'm sorry! XD Tbh nothing I mention is a 100% deal-breaker to me, I just notice these character design attritbutes are really popular with special-snowflake deviantart OC types.
BUT if you design an insane rainbow-themed character to fit into an equally insane world and all the characters are fleshed out and actually interesting, that's another thing. I like over-the-top stuff, when it's intentional and not just a desperate attempt to be xXedgyXx or ~UnIQuE~.
I mean, I can get through the whole thing if character is very good written but most likely I will be irked a lot. I can take manga better simply because it's black-and-white 99% of time.
@Michelle - Oh, it's okay. I'm actually having fun kind of laughing at myself for coincidentally creating these characters with tropes/designs that people aren't fans of. There's really a wide range of people here on Tapastic, so I'm not surprised. I'm glad to see it's not a deal-breaker though. I created my character, having him contrast with his gruff self. Of all of the powers for this poor, grumbly, battle-hardened old man to get, he had to get stuck with the bright, flashy rainbow powers. How will he deal with them? That's the fun or writing such a scenario. To expand on it, and to see where it can go! I like a challenge!
@CelestialNavigator - That's funny, because my comic was going to be in black and white, but I decided to go for colours about a week ago. Funny how coincidental this has all ended up.
Given the description, I can assume you've spend quite some time on DeviantArt, correct?
Bad writing sure is the biggest offender. I think everyone here will agree.
@CelestialNavigator Y-yeah... D: I've had an account there since 2003 so I have bore witness to many a terrible OC. Though I've seen these kind of designs all over the place really.
@Greg_Dickson Well, life is weird like that.