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Text: Lloyd Jardin “Garden” Emerald

A canonically aristocratic gem made sense for Lloyd considering his heritage. “Garden” emeralds are formed by inclusions of other minerals during formation, giving the appearance of trapped foliage.

Early designs + lore under the cut

Lloyd knows he's pretty different from other life on this planet. For one thing, their lives are so short! He knows he's a gem but doesn't know much about that. His dad is only willing to answer a few questions and is quiet about the rest. There's a lot more going on he wishes someone would tell him.

Lloyd was the first gemjago character I ever drew! About 3 years ago! Unfortunately, something happened this week and I lost all the art files I hadn't uploaded to my phone (so anything in progress :( ) This is a message to fellow artists: back up your work!

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Text: Pixal Kunzite

Despite Pixal’s multi-color Samurai X look, I decided to go with purple to match her debut, though I incorporated elements from both outfits. Pixal’s gem is located on the back of her neck.

Lore + early designs under the cut

Kunzites are a more recent development when it comes to gems. Finding another space faring species moved a lot of resources to declaring an immediate war. Unfortunately, this meant that by the time the flame of conflict began to die, resources were desperately needed. Kunzite are small, cheap, multipurpose gems meant to quickly scope out new planets.

I couldn’t find any in progress photos, but I originally had Pixal be a pearl. I even had a cool acronym for her. Ultimately, I decided to make her a smaller gem because the time Zane and Pixal spent in the same body made them good candidates for a permafusion and I didn’t want them to be too tall.

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5 unlocked - 2 to go

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Text: Zane Star Sapphire

Canonically being able to see the future and control ice made sapphire the obvious choice for Zane. The gem placement is a reference to the placement of Zane’s power source in canon.

lore + early designs under the cut

Sapphires are graced with the ability to see the future. While things often work perfectly in the gem empire the ability to see the most likely outcome of a conflict is invaluable in times of war. However this is also when sapphires are their most unreliable for seeing the most probable results is not the same as seeing the future with perfect clarity.

Zane is strange, even for a sapphire. While not able to predict as well as other sapphires, he has the ability to see glimpses of a certain future. Because of this he is less of a court gem and is generally given free rein. Recently he has been having strange visions of a pale blue planet on the far edges of the empire.

(Ooooh sneak peak)

I initially had Zane look much more like a traditional sapphire, with a dress and hair over the eyes (eye?). But none of the designs seemed to be working so I just went with something radically different to break out of the drawing funk. I tried to stick with the general dress silhouette with the big pant legs.

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No gemjago update today

Really sorry y’all but I’m swamped. Tomorrow I will post the next character sheet and poll.

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Text: Nya Lapis Lazuli

Nya is a powerful green with the ability to control an entire planet’s ocean. Rather than using traditional weapons, she prefers to overwhelm her opponents with sheer volume of water.

lore + early designs under the cut

Lapis’ are the terraformers of gems. Their control over water allows them to shape worlds to be perfect for colonization. Arriving before any other and leaving when their work is done, lapis are rather free when it comes to gems. This is amplified by the fact that they can carry themselves across space on water wings and do not need to be confined to a ship. Many terraforming projects were terminated when a fellow space-faring species was detected. War immediately followed, and lapis made good soldiers. With conflict starting to die down and resources running dangerously low, the need for new colonies skyrocketed and lapis were sent out en masse.

Nya is very good at what she does and she likes doing what she’s good at. She also likes the chance to prove herself, so picking a remote world no other lapis would go to would be the perfect way to stretch her terraforming skills. Most other lapis would pick up recolonization efforts closer to home but Nya has one that might also give them an edge in the war. A world right on the territory borders of the dragons.

My initial design for Nya made her a blue chalcedony to match with Kai (who, at this point in development, was a red chalcedony) but the gem, and by extension the design, had too much brown and not enough connection with water.

I finally gave in and made Nya a lapis. She deserved it. In this design I leaned more into the water aspect of her character but in the final version I leaned into other facets of her character. In the final design, her parted skirt is reminiscent of a samurai’s armor and her classic early-season bracelet made a return.

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4 unlocked - 3 to go

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3 unlocked - 4 to go

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Text: Cole Bismuth

The physically strongest gem and with rainbow hair to boot? Perfect. Rather than his lava arms, Cole now has the Bismuth ability to mold his forearms into different tools and weapons. His gem is on his back between his shoulder blades.

lore + early designs under the cut

Bismuth are durable and versatile. They are hardy gems, able to withstand blistering cold, crushing pressure, and molten lava. Their ability to shift their arms between different tools and weapons makes them indispensable in the construction of a new colony, or the revival of an old one.

Cole was sent out in a small experimental crew to restart the construction of an abandoned colony. It was abandoned in the early stages of the war due to its close proximity to the opposing, spacefaring species. While there he found a small group of defectors, not involved in the war and determined to stay that way.

My initial concept for Cole was a plume agate. I wanted to put the colors and patterns on his arms but they ended up being too busy. When I revisited this design I realized that I had overlooked an obvious gem with an already canon appearance, Bismuth. Their physical strength is unmatched and I liked the idea of Cole shaping his hands into a scythe and breaking up the earth. Their resilience to lava also fit well. The design element I was the most excited for was the hair. In early seasons Cole’s secondary color has been the rainbow, as evidenced by his elemental blade in season 2, and more recently Cole has been highly headcanonned to be gay and has become a comfort character for many queer people. Giving him a rainbow was the least I could do.

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if i make a ninjago steven universe au in the good year 2024 what fate will befall me

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2 unlocked - 5 to go

Please note that from now on polls last for one day instead of one week.

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Text: Jay Paraiba Tourmaline

Jay was an easy one. Tourmalines are also called electric stones due to their ability to create a small electric current under extreme stress. The gem placement is a nod to his eyepatch in Skybound.

lore + early designs under the cut

One of the most critical resources when starting a new colony is energy. It allows injectors to function and sustains communication. Unfortunately, wild worlds aren’t exactly known for having power lines installed. Tourmalines are an easy fix to the problem as only one is needed to power a colony until well into development.

All Jay knows in being stuck in his gem and providing power. Unbeknownst to him his colony has long been abandoned for being too close to a rivaling, space-faring civilization and thus caught in the crossfire. It is not until many centuries later that a curious gem finds him and frees him. From going from development straight into an energy cell, Jay has little real world experience and therefore is willing to accept just about anything, no questions asked. Due to his time as an energy source he has developed both claustrophobia and an intense fear of being poofed.

Jay’s initial design was fun but felt like it was lacking. The pins on the jacket was too busy while other parts were broad swaths of plain white and plain black. It was too unbalanced. Another issue was the color. I had many characters whose gems felt best being blue. This meant making their colors unique were critical. For Jay I leaned more into teal and tried to make his silhouette more defined. I’m quite happy with the result.

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Fanfic Writers: Director’s Cut

Reblog this if you want readers to come into your ask box and ask for the “director’s commentary” on a particular story, section of a story, or set of lines. 

Or, send in a ⭐star⭐  to have the author select a section they’ve been dying to talk about!

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1 unlocked - 6 to go

Kai

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Text: Kai Carnelian

Kai was nearly a ruby due to their canonical ability to control fire, but I figured Kai would rather be able to make fun of Jay for being short. So he's taller than Jay and his elemental power is now a flaming sword.

lore + early designs under the cut

Gems have been the dominant, and nearly sole, spacefaring race for ages before encountering dragons. Dragons are powerful but few in number, and the diamonds have more than enough gems to throw at the problem. This has resulted in mass production of lower quality gems. Carnelians are mid-low military gem, a type of quartz. Due to mass production and lack of resources Kai is less physically strong than he should be. He tries his best to overcome this with overwhelming proficiency in his weapon, a sword. Kai knows he is considered to be expendable and hopes to make himself noticed. After overhearing from a sapphire the possibility of a gem making an alliance with the dragons and overthrowing the diamond authority Kai set out to find this traitor and made himself respected.

As mentioned earlier, Kai was initially going to be a ruby. However, I felt that their stature and hairstyle didn’t leave enough room for Kai in the design. So it was discarded.

Now that I had decided Kai was not a ruby I had to figure out what he was. Red chalcedony was a strong contender for two reasons: it made a connection to Nya (who was a blue chalcedony at this point) and let me use the orange/yellow ribbons to imitate the scar over his eye. I still really like this design but decided to go with something a little more simple. Going with carnelian at the end also let me limit Kai’s color pallet more which will help his component be more visible in fusions.

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Please note:

I may (or may not) draw out more characters, these are just the ones I have finished.

I don’t intend to make this into a fic/comic/anything with a concrete plot. Sorry. (If you feel inspired to make something, go ahead!)