#if I can clean it up and make it worth sharing I'll update accordingly later

[spearminthe]

hi... sorry if this is weird but I've sort of been studying your hades sona to help with making mine ^^; not only bcs the art looks so much like it's from the game but the backstory info you put on your edits works so well. I wanted to ask if you had any tips at all, for both making your art look like the game art style and coming up with a backstory that fits... your ship is so cute btw I can't wait to see more !!

Waaa thank you so much, it's not weird at all :D I'm flattered that ppl still enjoy Minthe's sprite even if the art is several years old now fnfhnd, I've been wanting to make an updated h2 sprite but keep putting it off 🧎

In terms of how I came up with ideas for them, the pieces honestly fell together relatively easy once I started doing rudimentary research:

I knew I wanted an artist stand-in that would stay within the House of Hades, and if I could find a way to make them a little offbeat or morbid, all the better — As somebody with an interest in the funeral industry and different cultural funerary practices, I looked into the rituals that were conducted during Greek antiquity. That branched off into reading up on the uses of mint as part of the practices, and subsequently the role of the nymph Minthe in the mythology

Mint is one of my favorite flavors...my nickname already is "Min"...I enjoy minty greens and teals...I like Funeral Stuff...do some smushing and adjusting around and it only made sense to incorporate mint into their design, and later on I just decided to co-opt the Minthe namesake without making them the nymph herself

Their general appearance is largely a 1-for-1 depiction of how I usually draw myself, with the exception of the lack of glasses. I value my long hair and just decided to push it to that much more of a self-indulgent fantasy length, and dressed them in an approximation of something I would've liked wearing in that kind of setting (though maybe do a little more research into actual garment builds than I did lmao, I'm still working around how to explain away how they wear a "modified peplos" due to the sleeve and the high neckline kek)

If you're struggling with coming up with ideas, just find something simple that you think is neat and build from there! Really if you break Minthe down to their base essentials, they're just "mint artist" and that's it lol

Posing came from how I knew I wanted them to look like they correlated with Orpheus' sprite! :D He played a part in their design philosophy as well due to having green in his palette and leafy motifs, and I picked and chose some other aspects from other in-game sprites, particularly Nyx/Meg/Hypnos.

And for the art itself, make sure to use a hard brush with little to no pen pressure! The crisp lineart, black shadows, and the high contrast cell shading is ultimately what'll really sell making it look JenZee-esque. And ofc those funky little multicolor highlights.

Now if you're looking to make a dialogue edit...

Dialogue Box template | Fonts

That part is at least easy enough once you have the right fonts. I wanted to be certain that the screenshot I used was in the exact location I wanted, so I just ported one over from my Switch and worked from there!

Hopefully the art breakdown is helpful enough, I really love seeing Hades OCs to this day so don't be shy to share with me if you come up with something,, 🫶🥺