I have some new character designs to share! c: I’ve been working constantly on these since my last update- I feel I’ve made good progress even though there’s still so much to do!
Meet our heroine of the story- she doesn’t have a name on purpose, because I want the audience to be able to relate to her and put themselves in her shoes. Since she’s youthful, naïve and curious, I wanted these traits to shine through in her character design. I went through loads of concepts (some of which were really awful, haha) but settled on a final design for her that best described her personality to the viewer. I’m sure it shows, but I was really inspired by the ‘chibi’ characters of Studio Ghibli, as well as the loose, simplistic art style of Heikala (info on both of these here from my artist research for this project).
I’m pleased with her design- she went through quite a few refinements as I progressed through my workflow! Final character board below:
To be honest my favourite aspect of her is her ‘paper bag’ trousers- I didn’t want to put her in a skirt lest that undermine her childish adventurous nature, so I decided to go with these oversized paper bag pantaloons (which also matched her boots and cape much better… too many ‘loose hems’ otherwise!)
I really love them ^^”
Next up, we have our anthropomorphic deer character:
I designed him to both contrast and complement the young girl character, since the contrast of their environments and designs is central to the narrative journey. The palette is still natural while being different to the bright, fresh toned greens I used on the female character’s designs.
He’s very scholarly and loves a good cup of tea, I hope you can tell~
It was a real challenge to simplify the characters enough so that there wouldn’t be any issues when drawing them repeatedly for the animation- I think I’ve nailed this down enough, but as always there’s always the chance I’ll refine these some more in the follow-up Semester 2 project.
I’m pleased with the outcomes- targets for the next few weeks include finalising and collating all of my projects for hand in, and starting to think about the beginning of Semester 2 and how I’m going to tackle the next few months. Using my previous SWOT analysis’ will help me circumvent any problems I anticipate I’ll have, while also playing towards my strengths to produce a strong semester of portfolio work.
References
Collingwood, C. (2019). Anthropomorphic Deer: Anatomy/Front View Development [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Anthropomorphic Deer: Final Character Board [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Anthropomorphic Deer: Initial Head Concepts [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Anthropomorphic Deer: Palette/Colour Application Experimentation [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Young Female Character: Face Revisals/Development [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Young Female Character: Final Character Board [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Young Female Character: Initial Concepts [Digital].
Collingwood, C. (2019). Young Female Character: Palette/Colour Application Experimentation [Digital].
Heikala (n.d.). Instagram – @heikala (online). Available at: https://www.instagram.com/heikala/?hl=en [Accessed 2 Jan 2019].
chalon joy collingwood 