Did You Forget? It's your Birthday! - Wind Waker Link Conversion (Super Dungeon Explore)

One of the only things my sister-in-law and I had in common when we met was a fondness for the Legend of Zelda series.

When I saw Super Dungeon Explore's Deeproot Scout, it was pretty obvious that the model was a Link knockoff, and this is particularly clear, since a bulk of painted versions of the model floating around the internet are in Link's classic colors, including the one I've posted here (picked because I felt it was a pretty neutral scheme, and I couldn't find one unpainted).

I eventually got the model, but didn't really know what I wanted to do with it, because it felt too far removed (presumably for legal reasons) from the original concept. It sat in my pile of grey plastic for some years, glanced at. While I'd done a little cartoony work, with an earlier Super Dungeon Explore commission and for MYTH, the former was an absolutely terrible commission (it's been long enough that I can write about it without a rant: I really enjoy working with just about all my clients, but I got in a pretty bad mood when I was threatened over a small number of toy soldiers), and the latter was a bad gaming experience, so I'd spent a lot of time away from the genre/style.

But, returning to my intro, this year, for my sister-in-law's birthday, I felt it was finally time to step outside my comfort zone, and work with a very different palate and style than I was used to, and pulling this together for a gift was enough of a push to actually get the project started.

Not doing anything in half measures, I decided to resculpt the model to more closely represent Link. While Ocarina of Time is my favorite, this didn't really fit the style, and I narrowed it down to the original or to Wind Waker, and went with the one my sister-in-law knew better. This resulted in the above, ugly kneadatite modification that was maybe a 95% done version of the sculpt in my intro photo. I don't often find the right mini to make into a present, but I was quite pleased with the results of trying something different, and more so that she liked it, since it can be really tricky working in a style I'm not familiar with, but for one someone else who is.