Laura timeline
Laura is an original character I came up with for the Pokemon universe. I’ve had this character for a long time, and have periodically added and changed her designs for the various stages of her life. I’ve been meaning to do one of these for a while, and I feel like I learned a lot about the character while doing it. I put some thought into each design, so I put those thoughts under a read more to conserve space.
Additionally, I put each of these designs side by side with the “original” designs for comparison purposes, which you can see here.
Completed 8.7.14
Age 13 – Here we see Laura at the start of her journey. When I expanded on her backstory in 2010 I pretty much slapped May’s outfit on a younger Laura (as seen here). It wasn’t super creative, but it’s stuck. Also, since the first leg of Laura’s journey basically follows the plot of Pokemon Ruby to the letter, it makes sense to have her dressed like the protagonist of the game.
Age 16 – At this stage of her life, Laura is incredibly insecure about her ability as a trainer. I also did an age 16 drawing in 2010, but since it was just a recolor of May’s Emerald outfit I decided this time to take the design in a new direction. I gave her a coat similar to the one worn by the “cooltrainer” class in Ruby and Sapphire.
Age 18 – This is the first iteration of the character I wrote about, and her original adventures are embarrassing at best. In 2005 I had no clue what making an original character actually entailed, so I slapped an already extant design onto a new personality. I still have one of the first drawings I made of her (there were few to begin with). This is the first time I’ve wanted to rework her initial “design”, so I decided to change a few things here and there while keeping the key elements.
Age 20 – Laura at this point is trying to reimagine herself from the ground up, ashamed of her late teen years. This was the first attempt to redesign Laura (circa 2008), but I was no more creative in picking an outfit. The 4th generation of Pokemon was in full swing, and I wanted to give her a Sinnoh-like outfit because those were cute and “in”. For the redesign I only changed a few things, like the pants and shoes. I would’ve liked to change more, but… I really like this outfit orz
Age 23 – Having done away with both being overconfident in herself and having 0 self esteem, Laura decided to just try to be herself as much as she could. Her most recent redesign is circa 2010, and I wanted to go back to her roots and give her a sporty look. I kept some design elements from May, and some I added from other places. I was pleased with the result (and still am) but can’t help but want to try designing a slightly older Laura just for fun.