Question: First of all, I hope this question is acceptable. It is KINDA subjective and KINDA cultural, I guess, but it does still refer to language, I think.

This question was difficult for me to word, so I will expand a bit: I'm tasked with helping with a writing project for a friend. I can only really do cultural research, as I don't speak Japanese beyond understanding some very rudamentary words and phrases.

For the project, the idea is to come up with a nickname for a character with a cloud motif. We wanted to avoid using 雲 so as to not be too on the nose (think those anime characters that use kanjis like 闇 or 死 in their name), and also because we don't like spiders. So what I thought was that we could use 波状? はじょう is short and sounds pleasant, but basically I'm unsure if it's a good suggestion.

Is the word 波状雲, or maybe rather the type of cloud well-known enough in average Japanese vocabulary for a reader to understand the relation between 波状 and the cloud-motif?

Thank you very much for any help, and I again apologize if this question falls outside of what's allowed.

Answer: 
1. 波状雲 is a very understandable word if you can see the kanji. Less so with just the sound, since it's not *that* common, but still understandable with context.
2. 波状 (approximately "wave-shaped") is common and understandable, but it's unlikely to be associated with 波状雲 by most people, unless they were already primed for some reason.
3. 波状, with those characters, is odd as a name. Wouldn't you find "wavelike" or "waveshaped" to be a weird name in English?
I think so, [波状{はじょう}雲{うん}](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%B3%A2%E7%8A%B6%E9%9B%B2) exists in wikipedia. The word is the composition of 波 : "wave" + (形)状 : "shape of" + 雲 : "cloud".

I hope Japanese people find it pleasant to watch the picture below (i.e. the clouds like the wave-motif clouds as you said). For me, it's Okay.

[![波状高層雲](https://i.stack.imgur.com/qdk9E.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/qdk9E.png)