DESIGNING A CHARACTER (My Process and things to keep in mind)

hey guys welcome back to another episode of subjectively speaking the show where we discuss character design through a subjective lens everything we talk about here is open for debate and discussion so please leave your thoughts on the video below in the comments and let's start conversation while you're there be sure to LIKE and subscribe and check out our sponsor inked gaming each Gaming makes awesome gaming merch like bags play mats hoodies and more with our work designed by independent artists such as myself if you like you could also upload your own artwork and order a custom play mat of your own use the link in the description and the code subjectively 10 at checkout or a 10% discount and now that we got the boring stuff out of the way it's time to move on to today's video if you're already familiar with me and this channel I don't need to reiterate how important character design is and all the different roles that plays in popular media if you're new here welcome be sure to check out our other videos discussing character design in its many forms because today I'm not gonna talk about anyone else's artwork no no criticizing or fixing no analysis or breakdown today I'm gonna give you guys a glimpse into my artwork specifically my process for designing a character this video will serve two purposes one as a tool to help you fellow character designers out there further develop and improve your work and two as a platform to let you guys do a little criticizing of me time to turn the tables I spend my days laying into character designs that I don't like picking them apart and breaking them down now it's your turn after all an artist is only as good as their ability to take criticism so have at it let's hear it I've opened a door here that I may come to regret but no seriously tell me what you think of my designs in process and be sure to share with me your process for designing characters as well one last disclaimer before we get started this is not a how to draw video I won't be focusing on technical skills like drawing hands or making sure your character has symmetrical eyes I also don't want anyone watching this to think that they need to copy my style directly this is all about getting you guys to think about the key elements of character design and how to apply them to your own work alright I think we're ready to get started feel good excited listening to this in the background while you're doing something else nice let's dive in shall we this is Zul well the first sketch of Zul he's a character that I designed a few months ago after a strange dream that I had believe it or not I liked my original idea so much that I ended up doing a finished rendering of the character and built a whole world around him I even ended up writing a story to tie the world together but as time went on I realized that I kind of done this all backwards I'd go and attach the character that I written after I did the initial sketch and I decided that I want to put the time and the energy into creating a design that would better reflect the themes of the story that I had come up with so I went back to the drawing board the first step for creating a strong character design is to understand what the themes of the story are that the said character exists in Brazil the story is all about pretending to be someone that you're not because you believe that's what other people want you to be once you can isolate your theme into one sentence or even one word you know you have a clear understanding of that theme as the protagonist of this story Xul's should be able to clearly represent this theme to the audience [Music] once I had my theme figured out I could mess around with the setting for the story originally it was set in a high fantasy world of dragons and knights in all honesty it was just the first idea that came to my head and my original sketch was inspired by an old Skyrim fanfiction that I wrote back in high school but the more I thought about it a sci-fi setting started to make more sense the idea of this forced utopia a city that was so perfect it was almost creepy maybe it was run by a city of elitist that pressures the rest of the citizens into different cast molds this kind of setting would surely give reason to Xul's internalized desire to be someone that is not his real self the personality he feels like he must conceal it shows through in some way perhaps instead of complying with the wills of his social superiors he decides that the only other role he can play in this world is that of the rogue or the thief living in the shadows of this adil exceed and forcing himself to be someone he never wanted to be because he didn't know how to be anyone else and this new sci-fi setting opens up a whole new world of design for me to explore I had my theme being forced by yourself to be someone that you're not and I had my setting a broken utopia with unrealistic expectations of its citizens now to make my character when thinking about visuals that reflect the theme of being someone that you're not the first things that come to my mind are masks and robes I love characters that have masks covering their faces it's a whole new level of design potential with infinite possibilities my first sketch takes a lot from the original design but with a more sci-fi twist I keep the robe in the hood but I add a few additional pieces under the cloak I wanted some part of Xul's designed to reflect his internal struggle and reveal some part of what he wants to hide maybe a scar or skinny arms or prosthetic legs something that contrasts the imposing silhouette that he has which is really just a shell hiding his true self in my second sketch I played around with some new ideas for the masks I've been super into an archetype of UVO monsters right now called the rocket dragons they have these heads that look like bullets and I like how confusingly intimidating that looks it's almost a little goofy as if they're trying too hard to look scary I think that works perfectly for Zul so I traded out the mask for a full helmet and the hood for a big collar that's kind of shielding his neck I still keep the big cloak and the skinny limbs in his design but I experiment with different types of cloaks in my next design I start with a whole new idea what if his face wasn't the part that he wants to hide so I start off with a full face showing his tired eyes and even his hair I tried to break the whole cloak thing with this outfit too and instead I lean into this more roguish uniform but to be honest I wasn't crazy about most of this idea and I ended up covering his mask and nose with a pretty lame subzero mask but then I thought okay instead of covering the lower half of the face maybe I'll just cover the top half so I brought back the hood and introduced a visor under the hood to expose only his nose and mouth I then tried a new way to make his silhouette seem bigger than he really is an oversized jacket that's kind of like a repurposed military coat this allowed for a clearer understanding of his actual anatomy showing his real hands and revealing the skinny legs underneath it also gave him the impression of kind of a young child playing in a big raincoat trying to protect himself from getting wet but knowing he will anyway here I've limited myself to only four initial sketches but that's just because I didn't want a really long video when you're at this stage spend as much time as you can developing your ideas even the ones that you think will suck could lead into something awesome you just need to give it the time to see it through your ideas deserve this time and energy believe me so with these ideas down I decided I liked elements from sketches two and four so my next step was combining those features into one design the mask and collar from sketch to and the big coat and legs from sketch four together they made for a design that I was excited to develop further so I moved on to color this stage requires a lot of time too so be sure to explore all of your options my first idea used white in key places to highlight important moments of the character silhouette I was imagining the majority of his world to be composed of this white utopic technology and the inclusion of this color implies that perhaps he scrapped this outfit together from pieces of other things that existed in the world the rest of the color scheme was made of grays reds and yellows giving this very industrial look that would contrast nicely against a primarily white backdrop but blend in subtly in the shadows I had two other color palettes I experimented with but ultimately I enjoyed the first idea the most so that's the one I went with I did take from the second design not the colors but the idea of a glowing element his chest eyes and hands would glow red further emphasizing the value of what is underneath the shell that he protects himself with I also felt like it would make for some cool shots around the dark neo city with all of these ideas neatly packaged into one cohesive design this step would actually prove to be the easiest a lot of people including myself like to skip right to this step of the process when designing their characters but if you're working on a long-term project that means a lot to you I encourage you to take the time to go through the previous steps and come to the strongest possible conclusion here I can work with things like texture shape and weight the sheen of his metal helmet the glow from underneath his coat and the wrinkles and folds of the massive jacket the way that you choose to render your final sketch totally depends on how you like to draw and what role your character will play a lot of people think that objectively the more rendered a character is the better it looks but the truth is not everything needs to look like League of Legends splash art in fact it's probably for the best that it doesn't if everyone designed their characters to look the same nothing would ever change or improve so experiment with different styles and ways of rendering to broaden your abilities as an artist I myself draw my characters in many different styles depending on the story or the world that they will fit into [Music] and with that my final sketch is complete let me know in the comments what you guys think and like I said in the beginning of the video give me some critiques this is not the last time I will make changes to this characters design and the input of others is an invaluable part of the process also let me hear what your Processing's are for character design and how you come to your final conclusions thanks for watching guys don't forget to check out our switch and if you're feeling generous our patreon link in the descriptions really help us out a lot guys we'd like to be able to do this full-time and with your help we'll be able to spend more time on videos making videos streaming all the stuff that you guys like from us so please check it out if you're interested and we'll see you next week bye guys [Music]

Channel: Subjectively

Views: 742,107

Rating: 4.9706745 out of 5

Keywords: Art, Drawing, How to draw, Art School, Character Design, How To, Instructions, CalArts, Anime, Photoshop, Procreate, Professional

Id: hmGG-PGpjuM

Length: 10min 26sec (626 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 28 2019