HOME | DD

Description
Near through the ages. Prettied up from this meme template for drawing a single a character at different ages. Left to right: Infant, 10-years-old, 18-years-old, 25-years-old, elderly man

And now for some TL;DR (technical stuff and personal interpretations of each drawing)

Babby
This was surprisingly easy to draw. I guess because I sorta got a grasp on how to draw babies when I drew the Grimmer comic. With Near's design, I knew I wanted big, dark, almost-empty eyes and chubby cheeks.

As a baby, I imagine him being pretty quiet and boring. Maybe so much so that it's worrisome. However he responds pretty well to objects like brightly-colored rubber duckys. He's very curious with stuff like that. His love affair with toys and knickknacks began here.

10-years-old
An age close to when he lost his parents but also an age where he's probably the most out of touch with his emotions and other people. 'Everyone around me is sad but I just want to play with my toys.'

He's tiny so his hair still doesn't cover his ears yet. I imagine his parents must have cut it at that length while they were around.

This is probably my most experimental coloring panel. I blocked in Near with one color and pretty much put all my coloring detail into that blocked-in part. I thought more about the planes/shapes in this one so it has a more flat and graphic look.

I wanted bright colors in this one. The tree branches are supposed to be threatening. He has a difficult life ahead of him.

18-years-old
The age he's in the manga. I just wanted to draw my standard Near with a bit of added detail to his nose cause reading Urasawa's stuff has got me thinking about and loving noses. I just can't push it too far with him though. I've experimented and otherwise didn't feel quite right for me. Here, he is at SPK headquarters.

Value is a big weakness of mine with coloring especially with vivid colors so I played around with that. I'm not sure if I really tackled that problem head-on here but I like how it turned out.

25-years-old
A long time ago on a Japanese site I saw a sketch of Near at a night-time crime scene wearing an over-sized coat(probably put on by a subordinate). It was so neat; I wish I saved it. Anyway, I thought I'd try my own version of that kind of scene because it was so cool. Though the Near in that image was much more adorable than this one.

Here he is hard at work. I think as he gets older, he'd dabble with getting more hands-on with his cases instead of staying inside all the time. This kind of scene would come from that. He puts the coat on so he doesn't stand out so much with his white clothes.

Old man River

The chart originally had age 50 at the last the panel but I've drawn him much older than that, at least his late 60's to his 70's - maybe early 80's. Depends. I think he'd still look younger than he'd be. I wanted to give him this melancholy, deceptively sweet air (even at this age he's fooling people with his looks).

The Near I had in mind here was someone who's defied the odds and lived a long life but it's a bittersweet victory because he's outlived a lot of the people he had met along the way. He could just as easily be angry, bitter and miserable and maybe he was at one point years ago but I think he looks back on his dutiful hard work with pride and he does what he can to help the current L.

Old Near never crossed my mind until I read a fic where he met Mello after death and it was revealed he had lived until 90. My imagination just took off.

Oh, and after reading 20th Century Boys which follows the main cast's lives from childhood to early adulthood to middle age. Just seeing how the characters physically and mentally changed or didn't change fascinated me. There were also older characters who were practically old men by the last time skip and it was interesting how their experience showed on their faces. I also became a little obsessed with how Urasawa drew the Pope because he had such an amazingly kind, warm presence.

Oh and the way he's tying his scarf is like Johan's . Heehee

Description
Near through the ages. Prettied up from this meme template for drawing a single a character at different ages. Left to right: Infant, 10-years-old, 18-years-old, 25-years-old, elderly man

And now for some TL;DR (technical stuff and personal interpretations of each drawing)

Babby
This was surprisingly easy to draw. I guess because I sorta got a grasp on how to draw babies when I drew the Grimmer comic. With Near's design, I knew I wanted big, dark, almost-empty eyes and chubby cheeks.

As a baby, I imagine him being pretty quiet and boring. Maybe so much so that it's worrisome. However he responds pretty well to objects like brightly-colored rubber duckys. He's very curious with stuff like that. His love affair with toys and knickknacks began here.

10-years-old
An age close to when he lost his parents but also an age where he's probably the most out of touch with his emotions and other people. 'Everyone around me is sad but I just want to play with my toys.'

He's tiny so his hair still doesn't cover his ears yet. I imagine his parents must have cut it at that length while they were around.

This is probably my most experimental coloring panel. I blocked in Near with one color and pretty much put all my coloring detail into that blocked-in part. I thought more about the planes/shapes in this one so it has a more flat and graphic look.

I wanted bright colors in this one. The tree branches are supposed to be threatening. He has a difficult life ahead of him.

18-years-old
The age he's in the manga. I just wanted to draw my standard Near with a bit of added detail to his nose cause reading Urasawa's stuff has got me thinking about and loving noses. I just can't push it too far with him though. I've experimented and otherwise didn't feel quite right for me. Here, he is at SPK headquarters.

Value is a big weakness of mine with coloring especially with vivid colors so I played around with that. I'm not sure if I really tackled that problem head-on here but I like how it turned out.

25-years-old
A long time ago on a Japanese site I saw a sketch of Near at a night-time crime scene wearing an over-sized coat(probably put on by a subordinate). It was so neat; I wish I saved it. Anyway, I thought I'd try my own version of that kind of scene because it was so cool. Though the Near in that image was much more adorable than this one.

Here he is hard at work. I think as he gets older, he'd dabble with getting more hands-on with his cases instead of staying inside all the time. This kind of scene would come from that. He puts the coat on so he doesn't stand out so much with his white clothes.

Old man River

The chart originally had age 50 at the last the panel but I've drawn him much older than that, at least his late 60's to his 70's - maybe early 80's. Depends. I think he'd still look younger than he'd be. I wanted to give him this melancholy, deceptively sweet air (even at this age he's fooling people with his looks).

The Near I had in mind here was someone who's defied the odds and lived a long life but it's a bittersweet victory because he's outlived a lot of the people he had met along the way. He could just as easily be angry, bitter and miserable and maybe he was at one point years ago but I think he looks back on his dutiful hard work with pride and he does what he can to help the current L.

Old Near never crossed my mind until I read a fic where he met Mello after death and it was revealed he had lived until 90. My imagination just took off.

Oh, and after reading 20th Century Boys which follows the main cast's lives from childhood to early adulthood to middle age. Just seeing how the characters physically and mentally changed or didn't change fascinated me. There were also older characters who were practically old men by the last time skip and it was interesting how their experience showed on their faces. I also became a little obsessed with how Urasawa drew the Pope because he had such an amazingly kind, warm presence.

Oh and the way he's tying his scarf is like Johan's . Heehee