Hello!
My name is Diana and I am the creator of this website and of the EMCCV. The EMCCV is a tool for generating concept art, and it stands for
Extendable
Modular
Creative
Concept
Visualizer — short: The Visualizer.
Who is it for?
The EMCCV is made for creative people — dress-up-game lovers, writers, role-playing gamers and anyone else who wants an image of their ideas to keep and share. Or maybe you're at the very beginning of the creative process and looking for inspiration!
With the EMCCV you can create an image of your concept — or use the randomization features to surprise yourself with a new one — and share it with your publisher, co-writer, artist, fellow players, fans or friends.
How does it work?
Let's say you're a role-playing gamer and want an image for your character sheet. Or you've written a comic and want to share your vision with your artist. You open the EMCCV, choose a module and start shaping your character: pose, expression, hair, clothes and accessories. Then you pick the exact colour for every single item from an unlimited range of colours. When you're happy, you export your creation as an image and share it with the world!
The EMCCV is inspired by the Kisekae Set System (KiSS) and follows its viewer/doll model: the EMCCV is the viewer, and the dolls — we call them modules — are separate packages of artwork plus a configuration file. That's what makes it extendable: anyone can create their own modules.
The Origin Story
The EMCCV is the product of a nerdy obsession that was a Kisekae doll named SailorX…
The Sailor X Generator (aka “SailorX”) was created by me, Diana Thirring (aka Aeryn Martin or “Aeryn Diana”). It was inspired by Sailor Orion's Portrait Shoppe and lets you create a picture of your otaku senshi (fan-created guardian), based on the anime/manga Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon by Naoko Takeuchi.
The focus has always been on creating new characters rather than recreating existing ones. That's why SailorXv3 and the EMCCV have randomization features — and why the interface is a neutral grey: so it doesn't influence your colour choices.
The incarnations of SailorX
SailorXbasic
The first incarnation was simply called SailorX and renamed SailorXbasic once work on version 2 started. It was built for the Kisekae Set System. The base body was created by Emby Quinn and used with permission. The graphics were quite limited, both by what the KiSS viewers could do and by my own skills at the time.
SailorXv2
SailorXv2 was a big improvement: prettier graphics and far more colour and costume options. In fact, no other Sailor generator had ever offered as many options. However, the project proved a little too big to finish, life got busy, and updates stopped in 2009.
In the meantime, Doll Divine hired Drachea Rannak to create the artwork for a new Flash-based generator, the Sailor Senshi Maker, which took the number of options to a whole new level. Inspired by this, plans for a new incarnation of SailorX started to emerge.
SailorXv3
SailorXv2 was officially laid to rest when development of SailorXv3 began in the summer of 2013. My drawing and programming skills had improved, so this time SailorXv3 became a standalone program, with smooth, semi-transparent PNG graphics.
The final stage
As so often happens when you work on something for many years, new ideas kept coming and new wishes needed fulfilling. When the otaku world forums closed, a vision formed: SailorXv3 could fill that gap by taking on a new form — one that would serve KiSS content creators, support ideas that have nothing to do with Sailor Moon, and above all make maintaining and expanding a doll (or module, as we call them) much less of a hassle.
That was the birth of the EMCCV — and SailorXv3 lives on as its first module. You can try it right now in your browser.
Plans! Lots of plans.
The aim is to build a community of creators. The number one goal is to see ideas come to life as art created with the EMCCV — and to provide enough content to keep you creating for a long, long time. I also want you to be able to create and share your own content.
Modules
- Humanoids of all ages, shapes and sizes, in various art styles
- Animals
- Landscapes
- Maps (floor plans, cartography, …)
- Items like weapons, vehicles and buildings
The EMCCV
- A desktop version for Windows, macOS and Linux, for working with your own modules
- Loading modules straight from the web
- Support for scalable vector graphics (SVG)
- Tools that go beyond colour: contrast, transparency, rotation and more
- Drag-and-drop items and thumbnail menus
Community
- User profiles and character profile pages
- A directory of modules created and shared by the community
- Saving and sharing characters and colour palettes
- Creating, running and following online role-playing games
- Presenting your written creations alongside your characters
Development happens with the help and feedback of the people who use the EMCCV, so your feedback directly shapes what comes next. If you'd like to support the project, you can do so on Patreon.
— Diana