i keep seeing that post about how frustrating the buff guy -> petite girl type genderbending is, and i wanted to add my two cents regarding the addition of ‘just swap pronouns and don’t change the design’ approach because i think these are two sides of the same coin, as they both fail to really delve into what i think is the most interesting aspect of this design exercise.
the reason i find genderbending to be such a fun and interesting challenge is because, if you actually want to be good at it and put thought into it, you have to really consider the character’s canon gender expression and think about what it means to them and how it reflects in their outward appearance and presentation.
is this male character buff because he likes to work out / be strong, or does he aspire to achieve conventional heteronormative male beauty?
is this female character a tomboy because she likes to express herself in a more masculine way, or is she doing it to fight gender norms?
the answers to those questions should produce very different designs!
this website loves to say that gender is a spectrum, but sometimes i genuinely wonder if people actually understand what that means.
gender expression, much like gender, is also a spectrum, which is why keeping the character exactly the same won’t always work, in the same way that just making the character conventionally attractive won’t always work. but sometimes, a buff dude would actually just be a hot girl. lady bane, however, would 100% look exactly the same.
