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What are some good practices for doing character design?
When designing a character, what is the best workflow? Do you think much deeper about the character's character or is it just pure visual?
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>>2943120
What is the best source of inspiration and ideas?
How do you problem solve?
How much research do you actually need eg the names of different armor pieces and their purpose? And then from that create something nobody has ever seen before but still looks like it somehow makes sense ?
How do you make it look as cool (or any other goal like cute scary etc) as possible?
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Skillful huntsman
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>>2943126
what?
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>>2943135
It's a book by a number of industry artists. The book thread probably has a link floating around for it.
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>>2943126
didn`t find it helpful at all desu
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Skillful huntsman
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>>2943120
I think it's important to think about the character's character because that gives you a lot of visual things to derive in a much more cohesive way.
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>>2943137
your loss
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>>2943138
Appreciate the book, but does anyone have any personal experiences they want to share learning this stuff? I find it more useful to hear directly from other artists
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>>2943120
Designing is like navigating.
We want to go to the treasure trove.
If all directions are alright, that is the same as having no direction at all.
Work with limitations and set goals you want to accomplish with your design.
Do a few lines of text describing the character you have in mind, read about your subject matter.
Inform your design, with reference and reading material.
Based on this, you proceed with the task of now visualling abstract concepts, that up until this point exist as words and vague notions.
Go in as many different directions as possible within your given framework (your limitations, i.e. the core idea)
Whenever you start repeating a certain set of proportions/ideas, radically try and flip things on their head - when you are in this stage, you are not critical - everything is alright and no sketch no matter how ugly is judged, you are creating as much content as possible and slowly molding your idea, your approach to solving your initial concept.
You will reach a certain point, where it feels natural to judge your material - i would recommend searching to the very point you know you have to make a decision (i.e client work) You never know what you might get if you do another 10 minutes - you might stumble upon a great idea, or a happy accident might happen that suddenly suggests a far more intriguing direction.
Now - judge your sketches, what seems promising?
Isolate those - do rounds of pushing these designs - look at key elements that define a certain sketch/concept and amp it up 200%, then 400%, then 800%.
The furthest exaggeration might be way too wild - but somewhere before that you will land at something that is genuinely interesting, something that is not safe and has a clear direction.
Remember, its always easier to play down a concept than it is to fix a very boring downplayed one - go to the extreme and pull back just a little bit, thats usually where things work.
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>>2943988
now after your round of pushing designs you will either be able to discern what is most promising, and then you could do a round of variations, to really nail the design.
thinking of things as cohesiveness of shape language, is there a certain thing you can repeat to create a sense of rhythm and structure.
Do a tight version of whatever you pick - depending on what your goal is, that could be a painting.
Although from a design perspective, doing a turn around/ orthographic views is immensely useful, as it forces you to understand your design three-dimensionally.
And again, as a designer, it also key to understand what the context of your design is - this should be clear from the beginning.
If it is for animation - say a ghibly movie - a highly rendered piece of a character is not as useful as an acting sheet that shows motion and emotion of the character - while also showing the volumetrics of said character.
So
To sum it up - have a clear framework, know what the goal is - it is useful to write a few sentences so you have something to refer to as you design. Words can be used as a sketching tool, sometimes much much faster than trying to draw something out. I learned this from a classmate of mine, and writing has shown itself to be of immence importance creatively. Sometimes words also have an abstract interplay with each other that when exploited yields interesting visual associations instantaneously.
Good luck, friend.
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>>2945104
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