Who Is "Yamaha Suzuki?"
I'm turning 25 this year, and likewise, my OC Yamaha is turning 15. I thought it would be fun to take a long walk down memory lane and make a comprehensive post showcasing her development across the decade I've been drawing her.
Yamaha has ultimately become my muse. When I'm unsure of what to draw, she comes to the forefront of my mind. She's been with me longer than any idea I've ever had, and is symbolic of my development not just as an artist, but as a person. Her growth shows off my most vulnerable pre-teen years to my maturation as an adult to be able to flesh her out into a character who can stand on her own two-dimensional feet.
And you know what? Cringe culture is dead and I am free.
In 2011, Yamaha was born. Her original full name was "Yamaha Suzuki Kawasaki," and she was originally a Soul Eater OC made to be the estranged twin sister of Death the Kid. Her name actually stemmed from the fixation I had on dirt bikes at the time, and how fascinated I was by the Yamaha company logo, showcasing three tuning forks interlocked to form a circle. Later on, her name was definitely more fitted to the music side of the Yamaha corporation.
She kept her full name. While she became an OC in her own universe, so to speak, she kept the Mary Sue-ness to a painfully maximal level. An android born from a defunct laboratory, she somehow gained elemental powers from an accident in her development. This also left her with a ghost living in her left shoulder blade. Despite her strange origins, her personality as a calm, caring, and loving individual who always has a simple smile on her face stayed consistent. Perhaps I was trying to create someone who would support me when no one else would...
This ghost living in her left shoulder was, at the time, named "Aiden". Swapped colors and a dubious relationship, "Aiden" didn't have a "human" form until much, much later. While Yamaha remained the character I would draw during my most passive moments, "Aiden" became the symbol I relied on in times of distress. Which, as a severely mentally ill child, was quite frequent. I began to project onto both of them depending on my mood at any given time, which is probably why I grew to be so attached to them even in my adulthood. Something, something, human psychology.
I used every opportunity I could squander to draw Yamaha and her rapidly growing crew of equally wacky OCs. She even had green hair, and then short hair, for two equally brief periods of time. Somehow though, and I'm still kind of proud of young me for this, she kept that little cowlick throughout 90% of my drawings of her. Props to 12yo me for being consistent. Sometimes I still forget to add the cowlick, and it feels cursed when that happens. Yamaha is not herself without that little tuft of hair sticking out of her scalp.
Upon entering high school, my life was rapidly changing. And thus, my projection onto Yamaha started to falter, and I ended up completely scrapping the old crew of 14 OCs that I had created throughout middle school in exchange for coming up with new ideas that, as of now, have also been completely scrapped. Yamaha's character design, however, survived in the form of a different (trust me) character named "Kyo," who had absolutely zero development whatsoever. She was also much more brooding, which looking back on, was also another reflection of my mind at the time. The idea of Kyo in my head aligns much more with who "Aiden" ended up becoming.
Flash forward to 2020. We're in the middle of the pandemic, and I have the bright idea to start a TikTok account. I end up making a post that goes sort of viral, showing off my old sketchbook drawings of my original crew of 14 OCs with a silly audio. I had a decent amount of people say that I should redraw some of them, and I chose Yamaha without a second of thought. How could I not? This drawing was supposed to just be a one off.
But when I drew this later that same year, my entire mentality shifted. Suddenly, the other hundreds of juvenile OCs I had created throughout four years of high school and one semester of undergraduate college were gone, and Yamaha was back at the center of my mind. She felt reborn.
My girl was back and better than ever, and once again became my muse. I would draw her whenever I could. She would appear on the tiniest post-it notes or the margins of notebooks. I would sketch her in books or on my iPad (which I got in 2020 after saving up all of my part-time paychecks from that winter) at any opportunity. And with her redesign, her other friends followed. (It's not that they're not important, but this ain't about them.)
It was also around this time that I, thankfully, got rid of the "Kawasaki" surname. I was thinking of completely changing her name altogether, but after a decade of calling a character you've become so emotionally attached to the same name, it's kind of difficult to go back on that. Will I probably get blacklisted from any Yamaha corporate accounts? Probably, but it'll have been worth it.
Her girlfriend Zephyr got a redraw, though! In the old drawing of Yamaha having green hair, her and Zephyr were supposed to be holding hands. But back when I was a child and didn't know that gay people existed (or that I myself was one of them), I just chalked them up to being "really good friends." I really gave them the "and they were roommates" treatment before that ever became a meme.
And who else got a re-design? "Aiden"!!! She was finally beginning to become her own fleshed out character, the younger twin sister of Yamaha. For the sake of stuff I have planned for the future, though, I'm not going to share any more than that <3
Thankfully, though, as of 2024 or so, "Aiden's" name was officially changed to Akane. Akane's name was easier for me to change. "Aiden" had no meaning behind it whatsoever and was probably just a name I had heard on the playground at one point. Naming her Akane was me welcoming her into this new era along with her sister.
Yamaha was once again coming with me everywhere, nestled in the back of my mind at all times. She became my little dress-up doll, my character to experiment styles and compositions with, the forefront of all my ideas. She might not have entered college with me, but she sure as hell helped me finish it. It was in 2024 that I was finally able to give her a voice, in the form of a (still in progress) UTAU voicebank that I'm hoping to finally release this summer after years of putting it off. That was always my dream from the day she became her own character, to give her and her friends UTAU voicebanks. (So far, there's four that have been recorded and are being edited- Yamaha, Zephyr, Mimi, and Nora. My own sibling with voice Akane, but he doesn't know it yet. He'll be repaid with a lunch and a Monster Energy.)
So that, roughly, brings us to now. 2026. My birthday is in July, and her's is on the 20th of June. 25 years of life and 15 years of Yamaha existing in the back of my head. She's been with me through schooling, therapy, outings with friends, and every moment I spend awake. Perhaps my profound attachment to her is something I should speak to a professional about, but I like to think that her existence is simply a manifestation of my deepest feelings. She was created as a beacon of normalcy for a pre-teen girl caught in the crosshairs of despair, and remained unchanging as that girl grew up.
I sometimes joke that Yamaha is my daughter, but I feel like she's more than that to me. She deserves to be more than that. She was born to be a vessel for my thoughts and feelings, and has since turned into her own person... so to speak.
