To Lovingly Hate You

~Adeline Cordelia Atlantica~

Well well well... surprise! I went a little edit happy and made not one, not two, but three edits of what I imagine Adeline to look like! I've used screenshots of Ariel herself from "The Little Mermaid" as her base, and so the resemblance is there and clear I reckon, but I am very happy with how these came out! :D

And for legality reasons, the base images belong to Disney, all that cool stuff, don't sue me pls :)

I'm not good at drawing, never have been, in real life I'm super good at making 3D things like life sized monsters (odd hobby, I know XD), but drawing, painting, anything 2D is not where I'm gifted whatsoever, which is why I like using screenshots of usually the OC's mother as a base to work off of, just in case anyone is wondering why I can't just whip out completely original drawings of my characters, I am not that talented in that department, but I do understand how to work ProCreate and how color theory works, and how to trace of course XD

One more thing before I explain each image, yes I am going off of the live action "The Little Mermaid", for certain details, as the universe we're in (Descendants) isn't a cartoon one if that makes sense? So yes, her skin tone is depicted as it is in the live action because we're in a live action universe :) I know the live action caused some controversy when it comes to Ariel's skin, but I'm gonna let some of my opinion slip here, if the story does not count on or rely on a specific feature of what one of the characters look like, then it doesn't matter if it's changed, and seeing as Ariel's skin isn't even a topic of conversation in the original, then it doesn't matter if it's depicted differently in later iterations of the tale, so if I see any snippy little comments about Adeline being biracial they will be deleted, racism isn't tolerated here, thank you for coming to my Ted Talk :)

Also if anyone wants to know how I came to this specific skin tone, just in case anyone's curious for whatever reason, I took Ariel and Eric's live action actors (Halle Bailey and Jonah Hauer-King) and took multiple colors from their skin tones each, then I mixed all these little samples to get an average for each actor, then I mixed those two averages together, then I made it slightly darker since Adeline is also in the sun (she's a tropical mermaid so she sun bathes all the time XD) constantly and therefore it only makes sense that she's darker than that average :)

Anyway, now that we got all that official stuff out of the way, we can just chat about each image just for funsies! XD The first little pic is Adeline simply in her human form, and in her IRL human form, aka not a cartoon, the only change I'd make is narrowing her eyes a little because she does have some killer siren eyes when she's not looking up and being cute towards a certain someone, but also... that's exactly what I imagined her doing when I was editing this, so I didn't narrow her eyes, because she has a killer case of doe eyes at that moment and only one person could ever bring that out of her XD

The only indicators that she's anything other than a usual human are her long pointed ears and the faint lines on her neck that open into her gills, she's decorated her ears with some dainty jewels and is wearing a matching necklace of course, but otherwise she's in some more casual wear for once rather than her designer stuff, which she does when she's being more down to earth and real when it comes to her mermaid side :D

This one was fun because I could start to apply what I've imagined and described when it comes to her scales and mermaid coloration crawling over nearly every part of her body, and of course, a little bit of the transformed fanned ears are peeking out from behind her hair there :D She's also seen here with her luring eyes, a gradual, subtle purple mist over her original deep brown eyes :) This is also what she usually looks like, her siren eyes are much more evident, a mischievous look about her, this is classic Adeline right here XD The only thing that's more of a new thing for her is that little glowy blush in her cheeks that also crawls to the tips of her ears ;D And finally, her nails... her natural nails at that, yeah... those things are insane huh? XD

And I couldn't do all this editing without including one with her tail in it, because come on, that would be lame XD

Her tail is far longer than the traditional ones from "The Little Mermaid", it's also more slender, giving more of a siren vibe than a cute mermaid without a doubt XD Her deep purple scales cascade almost all over, creating a slick and seamless look overall, which I had to do because the whole shell bra thing kinda drives me nuts for some reason XD Her coloring and how she's more of a deep purple were for a reason as well, as creatures usually adapt their coloring to blend into their surroundings to evade predators, and just for that, Adeline's only special color as a mermaid is a deep, dark purple which can allow her to disappear in dark waters and make her appear almost like a shadow otherwise :D

She has no extra fins as well which may be a little shocking, but due to the size of her tail, extra fins would simply slow her down, keeping it sleek and simple for her is the best for her general build. She's plenty quick without any extra fins on her arms or anything as well, with a tail like that, she's incredibly quick and able to swiftly maneuver through otherwise difficult terrain with ease, she's like a stealthy, quick, compact build XD Her full mermaid look is complimented lastly by a magical aura around her :D

I've never gone this all out to depict what one of my characters look like, but I'm really happy with how each image came out! :D I had a lot of fun with this little mini side project, and I may start to do it as a brain break just for fun on the side, because bringing my characters to life in a visual manner like this truly is so so so so fun! :D

Feel free to let me know what you think of our girl! :D Is she what you imagined? Of course some things aren't pictured as her live action form is obviously going to show different features that may be described differently later on, but this is the best we're gonna get from me at least XD

Okay okay, now I'll go only work on CTT, we are very due for a chapter over there, this was just a cute little side project that I had a bunch of fun with, but we're nearly at phase four (the final phase) of CTT, so I gotta get moving XD

Remember to stay hydrated and to be kind to yourself today! :D

-Brooke