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So cool.
Loving the flow of the cloak. AND THAT SKULL. And those birdies! Daaang man!
I decided to get my lazy butt in gear too and do some drawing. Redesigned my namesake character <3 She was WELL overdue for a makeover, and now she looks stylin'...well...her hair and face do at least .___.;; still deciding what to do about her clothes
Comments, critiques, recommendations for clothes?
She's supposed to look and act in an unfeminine manner. Very sarcastic, very rough personality, but still cheery and whatnot.
Thanks :3
I'mma drop some cool character design bombs I've picked up from some of the pro's for ya but I'm gonna have to go all Simon up and down your drawing. Nothing you can't handle though ;D
When drawing a character's face, it's always ideal to have a specific expression that helps define who your character is. It's tricky to achieve this properly as you have to work around what your character's demeanor is and reflect that into their facial features, and later when you design their body, their posture, movement... generally their entire body language.
She's supposed to look and act in an unfeminine manner. Very sarcastic, very rough personality, but still cheery and whatnot.
I'm getting this vibe from her nose and mouth. She has nice sharp features and a nice sly smile, but her eyes are rather expressionless, and in the end don't help reinforce this demeanor. I'm going to be emphasizing this a lot because I'm absolutely biased about the eyes of a character. Like I really think that they're 80% of what makes a face. And even though you have some cool design choices going on with them aesthetically, I'm just not feeling them. Keep in mind eyes are the hardest things to get right, and I'm really picky and hardcore when it comes to them.
So yeah. My best suggestion, a bottom eyelid-heavy squint, or raising one eyebrow up. It'll work wonders, trust me.
As for perpective/ anatomical hiccups, I made you a visual. :>
[collapse="The visual I made"]
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- Duckpimp was correct in what he said; her eye placement is a bit off. When you draw characters, flip the canvas every 5 minutes or so to make sure you're putting everything down right. If you flip your drawing as it is now, you can see her eye is doing a bit of drifting
- Dunno what that line is supposed to be under her left eyebrow lol
According to symmetry it isn't part of her eyebrow, and according to brow line/forehead structure it shouldn't be so sharp when connecting with her nose. Orange line shows proper flow from brow to nose bridge. Might just be better off without it entirely though, your call.
- cheeks influence eye shape, like the note says. Try to smile without moving your cheeks upwards. Spoilers: You can't. With that nice wide smile she has, her cheeks would be pushing up the bottoms of her eyelids and perhaps even overlapping them.
- A smaller problem, but still one you should look out for (because soooo many people do things like this) is the shading on her chin. You were going for the right idea, but placement of the dark area makes it look like the prominent part of her chin is off to the side instead of right in the middle of her face where it should be.
- Poor girl, she's missing the fleshy part underneath her chin entirely D:
Unless she lacks a tongue, that's going to have to be in there. Random tangent. It's funny because one of the life drawing teachers was lecturing a new kid who draws anime about that just yesterday, and his exact words were "well I draw anime so I don't need to know anatomy". Of course, I'm not saying you're like that at ALL (obviously), but it's just an funny coincidental anecdote. Moral of the story is: anatomy, or I shout death threats from across the life drawing room at you :3
- Another small issue, but ever notice how ancient greek busts end at the shoulders? There's a reason for this - it looks better lol. Without the shoulders I'm having a hard time telling if it's a side view and she's turning her head towards us, or if her neck is actually 50 feet long, or anything. Assume your audience is stupid and spoon feed them as much stuff as they need to know as possible. It's also worth noting that if this isn't a side view with her turning her head at us, then her neck is extremely broken and she is dead from a fractured spine
:[ nooooooo
- As the notes say, the ear is aligned horizontally with the eye. And considering her eye is a tad low, her ear is quite lower than it should be. Her far ear is fine and dandy however, even though I'm not so sure I should be able to see it. I'll give that one the benefit of the doubt for you though.
- Also I drew the general shape of the cheek for you. It's a bit triangular and recedes down to the end of the mouth, so if she smiles, it'll dimple a bit at the corners of her mouth.
- Oh, and uh, nitpicking, but the specular highlights on eyes usually aren't long and thin. more square or circular depending on light source. Just sayain. Like I said, I'm picky with my eyes.
KSO as for costume design, it really depends on where she fits into. Clothes should not only function as a reflection of the character's personality, but their back story as well. First break it down into a few simple questions (if you're anything like me you have an entire backstory worked out)
Think about things like:
1. Where does she live? Where does she come from?
Cultural design influences such as japanese embroidery, or lifestyle design influences (factors of money, occupation, etc) and of course, genre factors. Most important part.
2. Is she part of a group? Does this group have a unified outfit to help identify them?
Members of a group may have clothing that looks mass produced in nature, with little personalization. Then again, maybe this character stands out because of small personalizations of said outfit
3. What motivates her? What is her philosophical or moral direction?
Simple enough. Evil characters look evil, may it be subtle or not. Ruthless businessman wears a dark teuxedo with a black tie - shows motivation of business and symbolically shows evil-ness of the character.
4. Does she travel a lot?
Trinkets, odds and ends, travel gear, practical things if she does. More personal, perhaps less practical things if she doesn't.
5. What is her personality?
The abrasive character might have sharper shapes in their outfit, the dumb thug character could be themed with round shapes, etc. Not any solid rules of course, but it has to say something at least
6. What are her flaws? Strengths? Weaknesses?
An overly superstitious character might carry around good luck charms. A character who has a specific skill or trait, like, say, mountain climbing, might have a rope or grapple hook.
Whatever your choices, make sure your design fits a consistent aesthetic. Keep in repeating shapes and lines. But make sure it's not overdone - the above questions don't have to all be answered by any means, they're just example questions to help decide what you character should be wearing. Sometimes you might want just a really simplified character and not put any of that stuff in. If it works with your aesthetic, then it's better for it.
Using color to symbolically represent things can be nice too, but I don't think it's as direct, and therefore not as important as physical design choices. Sometimes it can hit subconscious assumptions about a character. When I draw, I tend to create characters that can be identified directly without color. Silhouettes should be your main priority with a costume. You should be able to see the character's
shadow and be able to identify them.
At the same time though, I'm very visual with characters while they're in my head and add design elements with color in mind. For example with
this character I made sure that her hair just
looked auburn; her pants a light beige color. And as for that character I just posted, I tried to make it look like that cloak should be red. Strangely enough, people that I ask can identify the colors of my characters about 9 times out of 10. This is probably one of those things that works on more subconscious levels, because I have absolutely no idea how to even begin to describe how to do this.
So yeah huge post there for ya :D
Hope it helps, and I can't wait to see more of her sometime
