Would have joined this earlier but I was banned.
Scribbled out some very basic designs for the 8 main characters of
Project Livechamber which is kind of a spiritual successor to Halo. These 8 are the primary focus of the Campaign, which is ruled by 5 elements: Blood, Soul, Hive, and Mind, as well as an elusive quintessential element known as Aether. The world itself is a Dyson Sphere named Trinity.
The naming scheme is simple: there are 8 primary sapient races that exist on the shield world that each have their own "ring" divided for them in terms of territory. Each species has an elemental affinity; their primary element is first, and their secondary element second.
Blood elementals are "purebred" humans with a few basic genetic augmentations. At puberty, they have the choice to receive further enhancements and choose their fighting style by branching off as a separate subspecies. Barominid are archer-samurai with traditional values and wooden finishes to some of their armor while Neominid are more destructive CQC/grenadier types with Tron/Daft Punk-influenced suits. Maestrom and Deejay are a Barominid and Neominid, respectively; Maestrom is Deejay's father.
Soul elementals are "human enough" but have some radically different changes to their biologies under the hood. Drei is a Nullpunk (from the German "nullpunkt" meaning "zero") which are a race of warriors that have bonded with a Becryon symbiote. In terms of power, it's something like Iron Man's pulse beams mixed with the genetic enhancements of Halo-era Spartans and psionics resembling things Waterbenders can do. Luca is an ambassador for the Hadal, which are a bioluminescent mega-organism consisting of much smaller individual underwater micro-organisms. During infancy, the Nullpunks viewed as weak or incompatible with symbiotes are cast into the most dense parts of the ocean; sometimes the undersea life will take them in. Luca draws a bit of inspiration from bioluminescent sea life and Samus's Power Suit.
Hive elementals are a tricky sort, but they're generally the most inhuman and operate on hiveminds. Tempest is a Mechromethean, a general title for artifical machine life that seek refuge in a singular area. He has some similarities with Robo from Chrono Trigger. Most notably, however, he was created by "Father Time" himself, and seems to run on time. That is, he's biologically immortal as long as the flow of spacetime itself remains unchanged. He carries the ashes of his creator in his chest, and has a degree of eccentricity due to what his creator taught him. Vita, the Hivemind, is part of a Prawn-style race known as the Sceraphid that operate under a Queen. Under the mask, he looks something like a Prawn mixed with a Persian cat mixed with a pirahna. They use translators to speak with other races but haven't fully grasped English sentence structure, giving them a bit of a William Shatner inflection. They mostly eat wood in all its incarnations and carry a handy-dandy "toaster pistol" sidearm at all times to prepare it in the field, which doubles as a melee weapon.
Mind elementals have heavy mastery of psionics. Isulven is a member of the Becryon race, which can independently survive as soldiers. "He" reproduces asexually but refers to himself with male pronouns, and has a degree of insecurity over the concept of symbiosis with a Nullpunk. Becryon are sort of "blob monsters" with power over water and ice and can change their density and to some extent shape at will. Horus is a Sheolite and takes some cues from the Chozo race, particularly that he's from a humanoid bird species. Horus is a title, not a name - he heads his race's Senate and a "Horus" is a position of high political power.
The doodles took about 45 minutes but I'll try and get some more done of them tomorrow. I use a Wacom Bamboo tablet and Photoshop CS5.