More often than not, when going through the various galleries and search areas of deviantArt, the most prominent things found tend to be popular culture characters. It is because of this that many original characters have been overlooked and sometimes dropped simply due to disinterest from the general public.

So, I'm starting up a project now, where each issue of 'Where Originality Counts' will showcase 20 artists and their amazing characters and worlds. The premise for this is that each person selected has truly given life to their stories and characters, allowing new readers, viewers, etc. to get to know the characters.

==========================================

1.)

~Lenneth4 has quite an array of characters and worlds he has been working on. The first image comes from his story line: Malaika Princess Project, a roller derby that takes place every three years. It still amazes me how much time and effort he's put into the various animated sections of his story, allowing anyone to get a glimpse of what the project will be once finished.
The second image is of a main character in a project about a secret library that houses knowledge of great and terrible monsters. And the third image is of a character from a project that ~Lenneth4 is updating and bringing to the dA community for the first time.


2.)

This is ~dyn777's character by the same name Dyn, a creature capable of altering his shape and abilities by using beings and/or machines he's become attached to. Each form has been fleshed out to explain how this character would function in each form, as well as a nice general background. In total, six forms have been shown and explained so far.


3.)

With a strong interest in various villains to her futuristic storyline, as well as some rather unique creature creations, it was impossible to overlook *MischievousPooka's characters. The first is a race called the 'Gold Trail Cave Dwellers', leaving no questions to the various importance of these creatures odd appearance, as well as a few species specific personality quirks, such as a love of anything metal.
The second image is of Bombadillo, a villain whom is fond of robotic armadillos that explode on contact, or if they roll into a ball. And also playing into the futuristic storyline, the third image is of Dr. Koffman, a woman who is willing to do whatever necessary to ensure that she's better off in life, as well as doing her favorite pass-time of genetically altering herself as well as others.


4.)

~redadder515 depicts a dark and rather interesting world, with the protagonist Azrael *seen in the second image* battling against the antagonist CArrIoN *third image* and his minions *first image*.


5.)

=kyan's character Jarral has had so much of his life fleshed out, it's difficult to not feel bad for the young scribe as the world he knew crumbles around him.


6.)

Each of ~HidesHisFace's characters help put together a full picture of a unique world, where his Shata'lin race live and interact, with each new character bringing another part to this elaborate story into light.


7.)

Using two separate styles, ~dw-divastar has characters that are eyecatching at the very least. The first image is from 'The Bini Mysteries' a story of two eleven year old detectives, and the second comes from 'Bakermonium', a story about triplet sisters and their friends. Both stories have a great deal of work put into them, and the gallery sections dedicated to each help give a decent overview of what to expect with either series.


8.)

Learning about ~plangkye's character Thorn was quite a treat, with a detailed background, a personality that's easy to understand, and a good tragic love-interest twist thrown in.


9.)

Both of these girls are from ~Cokomon's series 'Rune Hunters', as stated by ~Cokomon "A comic of magic, mystery, and humor" with two young witches expelled from their academy, and an Imperial Guard Captain thrown into the mix, there are already two chapters up of this great find.


10.)

~Benjamin-the-Fox has been working on a comic based off of the idea that in the distant future, the line between what is human and what isn't has blurred. The character in this image is the Hag, a truly evil being who can ' partake' of other beings and assume their characteristics.


11.)

With a world of spirits, magic and almost anything inbetween, ~noble-phantasm has created a world of magic and mystery. The first image is of her witch character, Miarka, the second is of a guardian spirit named Luna, and the final is potentially the worlds most powerful magus, Fia.


12.)

Though the characters depicted in this image haven't come into play yet, what she has of 'The Chronicles of the Spheres' so far is a wonderful two chapters of one of the characters, an angel with a human ancestor trying to blend in with the others and keep his heritage a secret. This becomes especially difficult once he's enrolled into Heaven's Academy.


13.)

With a very futuristic and sci-fi based world, ~Sludgee worked on alterations to pre-existing species and in the first image, has given an entire race based on genetic mixing of various species, so much thought has been put into this race that it's difficult to not imagine walking side by side with one. As for the second image, a woman badly damaged in combat now has to live the life of a cyborg.


14.)

=SaxGirl1010 has come up with a character that answers the question of "if I were a teenage werewolf, what would I do" with her character Versa. With various situations played out, some humorous, others quite the opposite, it feels as if this character could very well go to anyones school, fit in anywhere really.


15.)

All three images host the characters of ~Mrmonkeyalsodraws's fantasy world 'Better Off Dead'. Each interact with the main character, Ramses, a slacker vampire suddenly thrust into hero-dom unwillingly.


16.)

A puppet designed to serve others, ~knivesknoll's character Claude is both a sad and interesting character. His ownership is switched out from one person to another following tragic events, and finally leads up to the death of his last owner, though he cannot comprehend it and continues to serve and wait for his owner to 'wake up'.


17.)

Though done in the Star Wars universe, =Lord-FSan has made a character that not only works wonderfully in that setting, but with the mildest of tweaks could also belong in any story. All three images depict Celia, a young Jedi Knight who recently has been having a difficult time dealing with the dark side.


18.)

Izm and A.E.D are two characters that *Darqx has been working on and revamping the background stories of these characters for years, and it really shows. Both characters are students of a boarding school, A.E.D *the one with red tipped hair* is a prefect there, and Izm is a drug dealer.


19.)

Though the majority of this character's information is found on a roleplaying site, I chose to feature *anchen82 because even though her character was created for a fandom purpose, she still fleshed out the character and made it work. Perhaps in time she will be willing to actually source the characters biography to deviantArt.


20.)

A young girl genetically altered to have amazing regenerative abilities, as well as accidentally having her DNA mixed with a cat, Neko-Chan is an interesting idea to a rather widely known and used character concept.

===========================================

Well, that's all twenty, please go check their work out. Also, I'd like to thank everyone that contributed to this, it was truly enjoyable to look through and learn about so many different characters.