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Beedalee-Art — Crash Course: Magical Girl Uniforms
#magicalgirl #magicalgirls #mahoushojo #mahoushoujo #tutorial
Published: 2015-09-17 05:03:10 +0000 UTC; Views: 84347; Favourites: 1614; Downloads: 572
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Anonymous asked: "Do you have any tips on designing outfits for original magical girls? I came up with a team I really like, but a uniform for them is causing some problems. I want it to be cohesive but for each one to be unique? But I have no idea where to start!"
Feels like I've been a bit busy/MIA lately... Maybe this contributed..? It started as bullet points... but then I got carried away... 
~12,000 pixels long later.. It's like two sketchdumps put together!! This is definitely a crash course as I could probably go on about this for days... but hopefully it'll help someone?
Also yes this can apply to other stuff than just magical girl uniforms but I ain't here for anything but that so ya on your own for all the other stuff!!
Disclaimer: I'm not hating on sixth ranger characters, Ace or Moonlight or Milky Rose or Berri etc. I just have a compulsion about outfits that don't match the main team/underdeveloped late gamers for reasons listed above. You don't have to agree with me about any of these topics!! If it works for your story or you really like that aesthetic, do what ya like. Just keep in mind my commentary for development/writing purposes!
Also, sorry for any typos. I am tired and tired of looking over this.
Edit:it was brought to my attention that ‘spades’ is a derogatory term for black americans, so i’ve changed around some of the symbols on my example characters. if you have already reblogged it on tumblr please reblog the updated version instead and consider deleting the old one! thank you!
Let this serve as a reminder to both myself and rebloggers to do the extra research when checking if your themes/inspirations may have a racist, sexist, or otherwise discriminating history with your character of choice!!
Reblog it on TUMBLR here!
Yes, if you were wondering- I have used many of these in my magical girl creating escapades!!
- A visual list guide of fashion terms and parts of clothing (PDF)
- Another shorter list of fashion terms (you'll need to google these to see examples)
- polyvore.com x pinterest.com x tokyofashion.com x tomandlorenzo.com
- Style Exploration x Understanding your style 1 x Understanding your style 2 
- Color theory 1 x Color theory 2
- Color palette masterpost
- The color thesaurus - rebloggable on tumblr here
- feel free to recommend some if you have any obviously i need to work on my color theory aahhhhhh
- Unique Characters 1 x Unique Characters 2 x Unique Characters 3
- Character design by shape x bodyfat on girls (more resources in the artist comments) x bodyfat distribution
- Masterlist of human features x Human features 1 x Human features 2 x Human features 3 x skintones
- Holy grail of character design resources, tutorials, and references 
Magical girl 30 day challenge list | My 30 Day magical girl challenge is here
HOW TO DRAW: Crystals x Crystals 2 x Crystals 3 x Gems x Gemstones x Rhinestones x Gems 2 x Even more gems
HOW TO DRAW: Fireballs x Glowing bits x Metal x Gold 1 x Gold 2 x Shoujo Bubbles x Spell circles / magic cast rings x makeup
HOW TO DRAW: Hair 1 x Hair 2 x Hair 3 x Ringlets/Curls x Ethnic Hair x Braids
HOW TO DRAW: Skirt patterning x guts/bruises/blood (for all that evil punching. tw for gore haha)
Sparkle brushes x Star brushes x Shoujo Brushes (photoshop)
Please feel free to ask me questions in the artist comments, if you need to know the name of a garment or something.
Happy Magical Girl Making! 
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This is basically becoming my bible, since thanks to following you and Caiterprince I've accidentally been sucked into magical girl hell and I'm on my third team lmao
Thank you for this though, seriously! I was wondering if you have any tips on doing magical girl names at all? My first team's names came so easily, thanks to you having already named "The Doll Collector", but I'm kind of struggling with my other teams.
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Really!!! ;___; THAT MAKES ME SO HAPPY JOIN US IN MAGICAL GIRL HELL
I'm so so happy this could help you out!!!
Team names are definitely not easy. Having set themes for the teams does help narrow down your options, but it doesn't alleviate the dirty work entirely. If you tell me what the themes of your other teams are, I could give you specific examples that might be more helpful than just general advice!
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MAGICAL GIRL HELL IS GREAT AND KINDA SPARKLY AND V TIME CONSUMING
and the teams I’m struggling to name are a red fruit+red flowers team - they have individual names like Bloom Clematis/Bloom Snapdragon/etc - but idk wtf to do for the team overall??? Their story involves essentially a clash of faerie vs fairy xD and technically I’m not struggling to name my other team - card suit angels - they’re The Valkyrie (so original much wow sigh) but I’m indecisive on if they have individual magical girl names or not but oh wait actually scrap that just realized I could give them names that would fit with their role/card in my larger magical girl org called the Arcana....
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That's amazing!!! thanks!
i can't find a theme 
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The best thing to do is pick a few themes you like the most! It doesn't matter if it's already been done, seems insignificant, is generic, or seems just really weird.
Like... as a few examples:
Something already done: Sailor moon has totally dominated the planetary theme, sure, but I love outer space a looot, and if I had a space-based team I'd probably consider using planets anyway in some way. Maybe not the same way as SM does it, so it's not too close- but I can still invent something cool if I mixed it with something that wasn't sailor fukus. Like aliens, or astronauts, or space pirates! Then it's not so similar to sailor moon anymore.
Something generic: Colors of the rainbow! What's unique about that? Every team has that, practically. And this is true- but you just add to it. You could base a team off the spectrum of light, like ROYGBIV. Then they could use light-based powers, and are fighting the manifestation of darkness! Or, they're more based on paint colors and they all use paint/ink/water like Mario Sunshine and are fighting something that's stealing color from the world- etc etc. And these options don't even introduce any other new themes yet! Like... are they futuristic? Do they all have a butterfly theme? The more you mix into it the more unique it'll get.
Or something really unexpected: One time I doodled about 6 different leaf shapes (Maple, Oak, Birch...etc) to make a specifically autumn-only / tree themed team. Who would think to use leaves to make a magical girl team?!
Just look around for something that makes you think "I'd totally read a story about magical girls that use [blank] as a superpower." Make a list and see if you can't make a team out of it. I hope that helps!!
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wow I really love you haahahah XD thankyou so much, that's really helps! i'll try yo find something soon <3
for example, once I tought about Nature, and powers that come from nature. But I didn'nt know how to make them cool XD
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Thank you so much for this <3
but i was wondering if you have another site to use instead of polymore since it isnt a thing anymore and its replacement website is awkward/hard to navigate and it only gives "Looks" based off of a keyword instead of actual fashion, aesthetics and collections
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Absolutely!!! I'm happy to share!
I'm still not over polyvore, augh. 
urstyle seems like it has the most similiar options to polyvore- and shoplook looks nice too, but I think it doesn't have any options for menswear. trendme has more customization than shoplook, but seems like it's the least active?
You can also use lookbook for general inspiration, though you can't make any sets there!
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I'm having a hard time finding themes. Any suggestions? You make a bunch of good examples in the first part (Themes) but without just outright thinking of them I can't find a way to find them, and I don't know a lot of things like that.
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Check out this comment reply I did over here and see if that helps ya start at all? The hardest part is finding the starting point, so don't be too hard on yourself if it takes time!!
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Is it fine to make costumes based off of costume from other animes? I don't want to feel like i'm copying
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Yeah! Everything and everyone is inspired by something or someone else. 
If you're really worried about it, try to merge that costume with another costume or fashion element from the get-go and see how you like it!
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I love this so much?? It's super useful and inspiring! Thank you <3
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You're so super welcome!
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Also the whole "tutorials and reference material" just wow,, it's a lot really ;_; thank you again
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Thank you so much for this. I've tasked myself with drawing my Pathfinder character's outfit (who just multi-classed into... I can't believe it exists... a magical child.) Thus far, it's been a bit of a messy restrictive process. I've made the mistake in telling my dungeon master that my character is making the outfit herself since I have the ability to do that. Since I have limited materials, however, I'm limited to modifying what's essentially the fabric of a ceremonial kimono and a bunch of spider silk built as a body suit and extra parts.
I think after coming across this, things are going to be a bit easier in the design process.
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I'm so happy it could help you out! Good luck with your uniform!
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Unfortunate and ironic about the spades thing.
This is an awesome guide, I love how in-depth it gets!
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It is really unfortunate!
Thank you so much though, I'm so glad you think so!!
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But also I kind of like how the sixth member (having only one girl in a group is called Smurfette principal so I like how the sixth member thing has a name, too) has a slightly different costume. Or how, if the leader has a slightly different costume then the sixth member’s costume more matches the leader’s, like the garters of Ichigo/Zoey and Berry (plus, Berry took over as leader for a short while although the bad guys brainwashed the citizens to mistrust her at one point, too!). I think that it ties them in nicely but serves to remind that they haven’t been there as long and are special somewhat. Of course, one must be careful not to make them TOO special especially since they’re in a team and not (usually) the leader...as a kid Sailor Moon’s special transformation always bugged me, why couldn’t the others have nice long sequences, too?!
Sailor Venus in the manga/Crystal was a bit like this even though she was the fifth member. She had a different henshin pen from her time as Sailor V, and pretended to be Princess Serenity complete with a crescent marking on her forehead. She was also the ACTUAL leader, in a way. Although Mercury still takes the cake for lacking the shoulder pads...which she lacked the lack of in the 90’s version but Pluto got them (or, lack of them) instead, plus Uranus and Neptune had shorter gloves...THEN there was Saturn’s brooch and the two rings on Chibi-Moon/Mini-Moon’s collar...I could go on and on about this, but, well, you know...there were also the original concept ideas...
Also, with W.I.T.C.H I think Will and Taranee had the top and skirt colours reversed as they were the new girls...maybe...
Another sort of example might be The Little Mermaid, how Ariel was the only one whose top didn’t match her tail, to illustrate her being the youngest and the main character. Plus, she didn’t wear a head ornament, but that was probably because that gorgeous red hair didn’t need anything extra!
At least it’s not like Winx where the costumes are all unique! (I like them, though...)
Sorry, this got kind of long...
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you are so super welcome!! good luck!
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This will be perfect for a webcomic I’m planning on making in the future.
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Awesome! Good luck with it!
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yay! you're super welcome!
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I've been using this tutorial for one of my final projects in my Visual Arts class in college, and it's been such a help!
I went with a rather unconventional theme for mine and went with ones based off the United States with a combination of animals (example: Arizona and rattlesnakes, Florida and gators, but the main one for the class is West Virginia/raccoon themed)
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I would do something similar but with countries, but I would try to deviate from the stereotypes
China-a ditzy, hyperactive dragon girl
England- a butchy punk girl with a Lion theme (lions are the symbol for England)
Mexico-A smart, shy, intelligent girl with an Iguana theme
United States-A (black) girl who is very kind and a bit of a hippy, maybe an alligator or moose (though most people think of mooses being Canadian tho)
India-a Fashion-y, feminist girl with a tiger theme. (she could be the leader)
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Dang, you get to make magical girls for your visual arts class? Also, that magical girl theme is flipping cool.
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Yeah, my professor just went with a vague ‘make a superhero/villian’ concept, and since magical girls do count, that’s how I got to do mine.
And thank you!
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Wow how fun!! That really is a interesting set of themes, i love that!! It's really creative! I'm so glad it helped you for class too, you're so welcome!!
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What impression do I get?
I get the impression that you need to use these girls in a story ASAP!
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Awww shucks!! Don't tempt me, I have so many magical girls already!! Heehee thank you though this made me smile!!
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Don't worry boys can wear skirts/dresses.
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it applies to any gender, as i mention in the post
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i know but thanks so much.
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