So, today's my birthday (January 13th), so I figured I should do a piece with the number 13 in it. At first, I was set on doing some sort of graffiti-based thingermajigger, and I had even drafted it and selected colors and whatnot, when I figured... why not make a piece that would also work as an entry for a contest?

So, I was looking through the contests I was following, and one of them was titled 'Genderbends / Alter Egos!', by: envythejealous. Before now, I was pretty sure I was going to make a masculine version of Riela (a character from the game 'Valkyria Chronicles'*), because her hair was awesome.

Then I noticed that her number in the game is 13! So it was perfect! And I was so excited, about the coincidence and about doing Riela.

So I banged out the draft within an hour and then added the details and colored it another [hour], and made three documentations. This is the third one, a picture of the [badly] colored draft(the image is all reddish because of the terrible lighting, sorry!).

(*This is labeled 'Personal' because I couldn't find 'Valkyria Chronicles' under 'Video Games')

(*Also, I've never played Valkyria Chronicles)

And since this is the draft I'm probably submitting to the actual contest, the character description is below, as well as a link to the original character's appearance:

Riela Marcellis is a main co-heroine in the Valkyria Chronicles III storyline, alongside Imca. She is a partial Valkyrie (hence her partially silver hair [silver hair is a quality of the Valkyria]). Before being transferred into her current squadron, she had been a member of multiple other squadrons, in which she was the only survivor for each one, gaining her the nickname 'Grim Reaper'. She is Kurt (the main hero)'s love interest.

http://static3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110821010740/valkyria/images/b/bd/Riela_Marcellis.png <-- in this image, you can't really see her collar or uniform very well, but I couldn't really find a better image... sorry 'bout that.

The traits I transferred onto my masculine version of her include her hair (which I changed to bright blue instead of silver, since I didn't own any silver colored pencils and couldn't make one, either), her outfit (which, of course, I changed into the masculine uniform*, not a miniskirt and corset ;P), her boots (which are pretty close to exact), her gloves (which are also pretty close to exact), her knee pads (which should be about right), her shirt collar and uniform number (which are also pretty close to exact), and the knife strapped onto her right thigh (which should be exact, besides estimated length to fit the masculine proportions). I used the actual Valkyria Chronicles III art book and character development section as a reference, plus notes, details, sketches, and unused artwork (as well as the original drafts) by Riela's character designer (for the sake of validity and credibility).

(*The masculine uniform was directly based off of both Riela's personal style and the standard uniform worn by the male characters in the game)

I did not include her weaponry (lance and shield) for two reasons: a) it didn't occur to me until after completion of coloring and b) I'm too lazy/impatient.