| Gender | Male | Race | Human | | Age | 20 | Class | Painter |
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| Appearance |
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| Silvery grey hair with flecks of splattered ink and paint interspersed within, tied up in a pointed top-knot. Most of Tama is wrapped in a loose brown silk shawl, but underneath is a set of comfortable linen clothes and several bags, belts, and pouches of art supplies. He usually wears a stoic expression, but that is due to his near endless internal debating rather than any sort of "strong, silent type" image. Has several small tattoos across his body, seemingly self-inflicted, and one large tattoo along his right arm in the style of an inky black spiral around his forearm, terminating in a circular ink mark in his palm. |
| Personality |
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| Thoughtful, but prone to flights of fancy. Constantly seeks inspiration and, when he's found it, goes off like a firecracker. Claims to be a world-famous travelling artist, but you've never heard of him. |
| Backstory |
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"Ya wanna know about the great wandering artist Tama, eh? Well, I suppose a story is in order, especially for a fan!
When I was a young boy of about nine or ten years, my dad gave me a piece of charcoal and a bit of old parchment, said it was for my birthday since we didn't have the money for much else. I took that bit of charcoal and paper and came back to my dad two days later with a near perfect likeness of 'im, to his surprise. He told me I'd had talent like no other, but I didn't agree. I took the paper and what was left of the little piece o' charcoal, and redrew and wiped it clean about a hundred times, until the paper was permanently a sooty grey, the charcoal had been ground to nothing, and the picture was as perfect as a mirror reflection. I gave it to my pa, and to both of our surprise, the pa in the picture flashed us both a wink!
Well, that's when I realized I had a calling. I practiced my art, I learned to make paints from nature, and, when I'd reached the ripe old age of fourteen years old, I decided to strike out and make a living sellin' my art, and searchin' for new scenery to paint along the way. As a couple o' parting gifts, my Mum and Pa gave me some homemade heirlooms; this fancy double-ended brush to match the tattoos (that I gave myself at eleven, no less) from dad, and this parchment-lookin' brown silk shawl I wear over my shoulders. I bode em well and, with a flourish of my brush, left em a gift of my own; a hand-painted trellis o' roses and ivy like no other, to keep me in their hearts.
I travelled by whatever means I could find for about five years, hitching rides wherever I could, walking wherever I couldn't, painting whatever bit of scenery caught my eye and selling my lifelike art to anyone who'd spare a coin for it. When I heard 'bout this trip to Tonia, I knew I had to pay a visit. If paintings of familiar terrain were popular, Imagine how much people'd like stuff they'd never seen in their wildest dreams!"
Firmly grasping his brush, he looks back at the easel and paper in front of him, squinting and adjusting a few things here and there, before removing the parchment, shaking it dry in the air, and handing it to you. It is a portrait of yourself, drawn to near perfect likeness. In the background, you can see the flames on the candles lit behind you gently flickering in a crude loop, the beads of melted wax slowly dripping down the candlestick, though it doesn't seem to burn down.
"Now then," He says, folding up his easel and stowing it away, "What's your story?" |
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| Inventory | Skills |
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| Item | Description |
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| Money | A linen coinpurse with 25 gold in it. | | Art Supplies | Brushes, styluses, and charcoals of different sizes, bottles of various paints in a cavalcade of colors as well as various jars of runny black ink, and an immense coiled ream of fresh parchment paper as well as a folding bamboo easel. | | Parchment Shawl | A fluttery beige shawl wrapped around Tama's shoulders. From the outside-in, it looks like particularly drab silk but, from the inside out, has the appearance of sheer parchment, making whatever scene is viewed through it seem as if it were a monochrome drawing on paper. | | Trusty Brush | A finely crafted, dual-ended bamboo brush, with one end bearing a brushhead of bleached and smoothed rabbit-hair, and the other end bearing a solid bamboo calligraphy stylus. Both of the ends have a spiralled design burnt into the bamboo similar to the marking on Tama's arm. In the center of the handle, almost too small to notice, "For Tama" is carved painstakingly into the bamboo. |
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| Skill | Description |
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| Drawn to Life | "Rule number one of a still life; If it's not real enough to pluck off the page, ya need to work on your shading!" -Tama, Travelling Artist
Able to, with some familiarity and ample time, paint simple objects into creation. In the past, he could make near anything, but something about the air in Tonia causes the paints and inks to run in a way that means Tama can't quite get complicated things like money or other big stuff just right. Additionally, it may take on certain characteristics (hardness of steel in a tool or weapon, fluidity of water, ETC) but it IS still just paint in the end. | | Paint the town Red | "Listen, kid. Running out of paper just means you've run out of creative insight! When it all boils down to it, an artist's medium can be anything! Or, in a desperate situation, with enough skill, it can even be nothing!" -Tama, Wandering Painter
Can flip up parchment shawl and, using interior surface as a "parchment", paint onto it as if painting onto the world, then flick it to splatter the drawn shapes perfectly onto the environment. There's only so much room, however, and Tama has to soak it overnight to get the stains out once it's full. You should never scrub silk, after all. | | Enterprising Artist | "Ya can't make a landscape of daisies with lemon-yellow paint, it's too gaudy and citrine! Natural colours, I tell ya, Natural colours!" - Tama, Roving Dauber
Money is tight, and when you've got a beautiful valley landscape perfectly blessed by the golden sunset lying right in front of you, it won't do to travel days back to town for paints. With enough time (about a day of work) and ample resources, Tama can fabricate paints that match the natural colours around him, using sources from nature. |
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