PERSONALITY
From the start, I wanted this “hero” to suffer from a superiority complex. He was going to be charismatic, charming, but manipulative, calculating, and deadly. A perfectionist. He is the one savior of humanity, the smartest, most morally correct, and the most perfect specimen. The original Leonardo was probably a super nice guy, but he’s been made into this grander-than-life persona that borderlines on god/myth status, and I wanted to portray that via his personality — basically, as someone who is full of himself.
Ozymandias from the original “Watchmen”, inspired me to give him this icy flair, and have him make decisions for “the best of human kind”, even if that meant making it ok to wipe out half of the population, because in the long run, it’s for the greater good.
AESTHETIC
Visually, I wanted Da Vinci to represent the sun, a Greek god, and the epitome of the Renaissance, the rebirth. His hair would be golden and adorned with twists and locks, and he’d be wearing some kind of shinning armor, like an archangel flying down from the sky. This lead me to giving him actual wings — which actually worked perfect for Da Vinci. Obsessed with mechanics and the ability to fly, the OG Leo spent a lot of his time designing devices and contraptions that would do just that. Da Vinci’s suit would be the result of such work: massive metallic wings that both reflect and block out the sun, both blinding us with light and keeping us in the dark. I even considered (as part of his personality), to make Da Vinci never step on the ground — he’d always be suspended mid air — because the ground is “beneath him”. As an additional touch I decided to give him an under-armor suit (seen on his arms only), which would look like stylized muscles (like the suits in the Tarsem movie, “The Cell”).
REDESIGN
The original design from 2017 was never fully finished, but it was a key cornerstone for the redesign. Distancing myself from the previous realistic approach, I decided I wanted this new redo to fit into a more “Disney-fied” and the likes of an Animated Series approach—mainly because it would create a bigger contrast (think of “Watchmen” or “The Boys” as an animated cartoon show, but just as dark, if not more; how beautifully effed up would that be?). I simplified a lot of the details from the original design to fit into the more animated series aesthetic, such as reducing the rendering on the wings, or their jaggedness, and focused more on showcasing the personality through expression and pose. It was important to convey the character’s energy right away.
NAME
I went through several options for Da Vinci’s new moniker, like “Captain Sun”, or just “Leo”, but “The Vitruvian Man” seemed like the best choice. The original drawing from the 1490s was Leonardo’s attempt at representing the ideal human body proportions. A perfect example of Leonardo’s attraction toward perfection. And so it perfectly worked for this character: the perfect specimen. A genius and forever young.
POWERS/ABILITIES
Smartest man in the world. Super genius-level intellect and philanthropist. His armor grants him superhuman strength, flight, force blasters, speed, durability, and regenerative life support. Has X-ray vision.
KEYWORDS
Scientist, megalomaniac, engineer, Renaissance, visionary, genius. Sun.
OLD 2017 SKETCH
◉
"The Seven Luminaries" is a fictitious team where iconic visual artists* are reimagined as Animated Series/RPG superheroes, supervillains and everything in-between, with inspirations drawn from comics, movies, anime, and shows across the ages.
Project was originally conceived in 2017.
(*for this specific project, I narrowed “artists” to those who create static [no moving pictures] works of art.)
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely on purpose 😏
