Sunspot Mascot Concept #1 (Patreon)

While I was in the process of making sketches for my Ashe game, I decided to go ahead and attempt a to make a full concept art for the mascot character that I have previously mentioned wanting to make. 

I mainly intended to make a mascot to use as a fun stand-in for myself and to be a representative of the content I make. An extremely rough idea of the character has existed in my mind before I even released my first game (see: my Patreon banner), but I didn't want to force her and instead allowed a design to form naturally over time. This mostly meant that I'd occasionally test color schemes or scribble down hairstyles or just make an image in my mind but never go so far as to actually draw a full design. Finally I took the time to combine those theoretical designs and see if I could make it work in practice. 

When I started on this concept art, I took the elements that I was already pretty confident in—starry hair, fiery skin, "sunspot" marks, dark eyes, and minimal clothing, and tried to build an appealing design around them. I started with having her wear a gray bikini, and then drew a spiraling star pattern on her leg in order to unify her body with her hair. I looooove cropped jackets and initially tried adding a colorful jacket over the otherwise simple bikini. I started to think it might've been a bit excessive and so I made an alternate design with just the bikini. Ultimately, I found myself following the logic of the starry leg acting as a sort of "stocking" and so decided to use the same starry pattern as makeshift clothing for the rest of her body. I believe I prefer that design, but I still think about possibly still incorporating a cropped jacket.

The name, "Flare", is also something that I conceived of pretty early on. Naturally I wanted her name to be sun-themed, but I still wanted it to sound like a normal name. "Flare," a reference to solar flares, sounds cute and can be reasonably interpreted as a regular name.

I'm not much a person to concern myself with making original characters, but I have in the past wanted to become a character designer. That ship has sailed for now considering how little experience I have in that specific field, but working on Flare's design did spark some of my old passion for concept art, and I can definitely see the appeal in making original characters now that I've poured so much energy into trying to represent part of myself with one.

I've gone into so much detail about her creation because of how important it is to me that I get this right, and now that her first concept is complete, I'm eager to get your feedback! I'd love to know anything about her design that stands out to you, good or bad. What personality do you think she has? Which design consideration do you prefer? All of your responses will be taken to heart! 

At the end of the day, I've called this "Concept #1" for a reason. Her design is totally subject to change, and I'll likely need to continue evolving her design before I feel comfortable using her on all my banners/avatars/etc.