Finalising Isla

Isla is one of my newest characters and her story equally so, while I was happy with her look as a general I wanted to take some time to revisit different aspects of her clothing and adapt them or change them entirely if needs be.

The majority of her story sees Isla partnering/shadowing Hans, a Woodfarer who tries to teach Isla the ways of the Woodfarers in a bid to help Isla to discover who she is at heart whilst also evading those out to harm her in the dark depths of the forest.

Woodfarers are relatively nomadic and generally quite reclusive, so all their clothing and tools are designed and made to serve multiple purposes. So their clothing not only serves to protect the wearer from the environment around them but also to mask or conceal their presence in the forest too in a similar manner to camouflage on soldiers.

Most of their clothing tends to be very deep and muted shades of brown, green and some grey too and their clothing is designed to be a one fits all affair too, so bar a few hints of colour there is no differentiation between masculine or feminine clothing. Though there is a differentiation between adult clothing and childrens clothing, with most adults wearing a mix of wool and leather clothing geared for working in the forest, where Woodfaring children wear purely woolen clothing mostly for warmth purposes.

With this in mind I set about tweaking Isla's outfit to fit more with the Woodfarers general way of life, her shirt is a deep muted sandy grey colour with deep brown piping while her trousers are a rich green, the idea being that the colours blend into the dirt and foliage of the forest floor and the roots of trees. Additionally Hans gives her a deep brown cape to offer better concealment and offer additional warmth and finally she has brown boots and a brown belt with a red pouch attached.

While I am still unsure if I really like the cape or not, I love the little flick of deep red added by that pouch, so the pouch will stay but maybe the cape will go? That might wind up being built into the story if it annoys me enough. Though the Woodfaring way, is that nothing is simply wasted, so the dress that Isla was wearing when Hans first stumbled across her will be collected by other Woodfarers and repurposed as something else, so if she/I decide that she will be shedding her cape then, maybe she will leave it or gift it to another Woodfaring child or something like that?

After some testing in different lights and in varied foliage, the outfit works quite effectively to conceal her amongst the forest, though Hans is quite keen to point out that keeping Isla hidden will be quite difficult as very few Woodfaring children have either flesh or hair that glistens like freshly fallen snow.

However one thing that I will be changing is a staff that is gifted to Isla by Hans, I have made a few different staff but am not quite happy with any of them, so I will be making a new staff. I'm thinking something carved from a twig but dual purposed so not only can it be used as a staff but also as a crutch if Isla should need. Additionally I also want her to be able to suspend her lantern from it too which not only frees up one hand to navigate denser foliage but then maybe she could jab the staff into the ground and use it almost like a lamp post while she and Hans gather wood etc? I will post a couple of concept sketches of that soon