#character design tutorial

[shirecorn]

Your reindeer designs give me such childish joy I can't wait to see the rest. What's your process (aka any advice) for designing from scratch with something like just a name or concept?

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You can see my process unfold in real time by joining any tier of my patreon discord. Which doesn't even have to go through patreon! If you want, you can just pay me $20 and let you in for a year (and then lose track and probably keep you anyway)

Here's a preview using comet! (nevermind the preview thing I wrote you a whole lecture lol)

initial sketches in 2021:

Revisited in 2022 and 2023

I was constantly asking which design was the weakest, why, and how to fix it. Whenever I tested without the magical comet behind it, people could only guess who comet was by process of elimination.

I didn't want to rely on throwing icons into the design. I wanted each one to communicate through shape and silhouette alone. It would be like drawing a little cherub with a bow and arrow floating along with cupid. If you have to include a nametag to communicate, your design can be improved.

So I tried a few different strategies to say "comet" before I realized I could twist the antlers into any shape I wanted. I was worried I would have to discard the drawing and restart from scratch! Which is what I did for rudolph about 6 times before I had a breakthrough.

Then I gave my patrons a brief lesson in antlers to explain where and why I was placing the tines. When I stray from the caribou structure, I do so knowingly in order to achieve something that cannot be achieved within the caribou shape, like dancer's tutu. Know the rules before you break them. My goal is to make animal nerds (myself chief among them) happy when they see species-specific anatomy instead of cop outs.

I tried a few things before figuring out antlers could become comet

Another thing that often caribou have is an unsymmetrical "spork" that comes forward off only one antler. I figured this out by looking at hundreds of reindeer pictures and saving them to my reference folder. A few of my designs have this, that's what the little spiral is in the final comet antler design.

When I put comet in my lineup, I realized that the antlers I drew were way more stylized, chunky, and "tribal" than the others. I had already changed the proportions on one of my designs to match, so then I had to hack away at the basic comet rack to make it look natural.

I already knew that comet's colors would be easy because a basic reindeer already Has the big comet on the shoulder. But here's a peak at all the reindeer images I posted for my patrons to look at.

As you can see below, I chose reindeer markings for all my designs instead of other deer or animals. Even vixen is tied to actually possible reindeer patterns rather than copy-pasting a fox. Almost all of my designs have light-colored anklets on dark colored legs, which is very common with caribou of any color. This is the sort of thing no one tells you; you have to observe it yourself.

Ft cupid's early design! I was continually testing out my reindeer silhouettes and colors on new people, taking their feedback, and fixing what wasn't clicking.

I know I could have made vixen sexy and curvy to play into a recognizable trope, but I really wanted them to be scary and fox-like. Sometimes you gotta do what you want and not what you think will appeal to audiences. Reindeer Days is a purposeful exercise in audience resonance. Most of my art is 100% me and what I feel like doing with no regards to anyone else. So it was a fun challenge!

My patrons also got to see me making fun of corporate designs for recognizably/cliches at the expense of literally anything good

One of these is going to get a lot more "that must be vixen!" results from people who aren't constantly thinking about animal colors, markings, hunting strategies, and teeth.

And one rocks.

Vixen changed the least from the initial 2021 concept!

A Vixen is a female fox. In english slang, it means a cunning, fierce human woman, and sometimes sexually attractive or promiscuous. Quite often an insult to someone because she won't date you!

But to me, a vixen is an animal. A predator.

When designing to reference something, I like to hit it at multiple angles, referencing obscure trivia about something to delight and educate. This is done by researching a topic deeply, far below surface level and beyond what you think you need to make your design. Or in my case its just knowing a bunch of animal trivia already.

After researching/dredging your knowledge, sit there and Think. Don't draw anything. Come up with several ideas and then throw them all in at once for the ultimate trivia design.

Trivia about red foxes:

They have Long bushy tails

They have teeth that include large sharp canines, flat incisors, triangular premolars, and chunky molars with points on them that slide scissor-like with the molars above to cut meat via chewing

They hunt rodents in burrows under the snow by jumping into the air, arcing, and slamming down with their face through the snow

They are orange

They have a dark vertical stripe on their snout

They have black legs, with the backs and bottoms being orange

Translated into the design:

Pose based on a fox jumping, about to land in the snow

Antlers twisted to resemble teeth

Long (for a reindeer) bushy tail

black mark on snout

Some adjustment to the pose to be at the top of the arc and flow better.

Tinkering with the design to make it recognizable but not 100% copypasta fox

I was finally happy with a design that absolutely showed "fox" while still being creative and plausibly caribou shaped. This would absolutely communicate who it is! I thought!

The most obvious one of the bunch! After all, everyone knows what a vixen is!

Nope! No they do not

Want to be part of the design process, help me with WIPs months before everyone else, see exclusive doodles every day, and join a funky little community?

(you also get to see photos of my dog)

Connect your discord to your patreon and join any tier to automatically get added to the server. Not a fan of patreon or monthly subscriptions? message me here, on ko-fi, or via email (shirecorn.art@ gmail.com) and ask if you can pay $20 to get put in the server for at least a year and longer if we work it out later!

This was supposed to be a preview to get you to pay me but instead I wrote an entire lecture for free because I can't help myself.

Want to thank me for the free info? Tag me when you use what you learned! Comment and give feedback! If I could pay rent with attention I would never need anything else in life.

You can also thank me by tipping my ko-fi! I use it to buy pens since I die if I have caffeine. But could you imagine??

#shire screams #shire draws #art tips #art tutorial #character design #character design tutorial #tutorial #behind the scenes #design tutorial #design tips #reindeer days #ask #ramble machine

[laboratoryrats]

Art from The Road to El Dorado

#road to el dorado #el dorado #art book #digital art #movie art #character art #character design #character design tutorial #illustration #dreamworks #dreamworks animation

[art-tnt]

A combination tutorial for character design stylization and digital coloring by tokyolondon

#art #art tutorial #tokyolondon #clip studio paint tutorial #digital coloring tutorial #character design tutorial #how to make an OC

[magician-hero]

There's a bit of a disucssion on how to add blush to characters with melanin on twitter and I kinda lowkey got tired of people pretending there's only two options. Of course my guide doesn't capture all of them but here are the ones I actually can formulate opinions on!

Here's the alt text:

This is mostly my personal opinion. It's not the law on adding blush to character's with melanin as we don't blush at all. Blood doesn't show through melanin so it's harder to capture things like light scattering and blush. However it's still desired to portray blushing! This is a quick guide on how I feel about a few stylistic choices people make to add blush or blush effects!

Outlined simple circles are one one of my favorites! They're not really at all realistic but follow the same stylisitc rules as anger marks like this which I believe makes them passable and more universal!

Smooth Pink Blush is my least favorite approach. I probably didn't really try to do it justice but most people don't really try applying light pink make up for blush from what I've seen. Make up is realtively a good reference "realistic approach for the hypothetical". I'm sure there are situations where it works, but I've never seen a case where it looks particular good.

(I'm being nice about this one btw.)

Darker Brown Blush is fine! It can sometimes go very wrong if you use desaturated browns however and it does not give the same impression as a blush. Remember that blushes are caused by a blood in the face. It's good! But if not executed correctly it can sometimes not work all that well.

Other than outlined circles/ovals I enjoy the approach of red-browns being used for blush. It keeps in mind what blushes are caused by while also keeping in mind that melanin would probably act more as a filter. Makes things look a little more lively than number 3!

Univesal best option , these can be light pink. You've won the lottery if you do this.

(Blushes made with slash marks since I didn't give a descriptor)

#art tutorial #art #turtorial #tutorial on dark skin #tutorial art #drawing tutorial #character design #design tutorial #character design tutorial #hero tutorials #moon tutorials #this isn't really a guide or tutorial though its more so my opinion. all of these are “okay” but some have more objective thought

[cowsabungus]

A guide to designing wheelchair using characters!

I hope this helps anyone who's trying to design their oc using a wheelchair, it's not a complete guide but I tried my best! deffo do more research if you're writing them as a character

#art #original art #artist #oc art #original character #queer #disabled #disabled rights #disability #disability pride month #tutorial #art tutorial #disabled character #design tutorial #drawing tutorial #Tumblr tutorial #character design #character illustration #concept art

[shoomlah]

how do you consistently draw the same character without it looking weird or off every different time?? also how do i coordinate faces, i always make the eyes too far apart or too big or too small or make the mouth too close to the nose or chin edge. If you have any advice I'd really appreciate it since it looks like you have your art shit figured out 🙏

Oh man SO so much of it is just practice, and you're not alone! I honestly think everyone struggles with a sort of "generification" of their characters' features the more they draw them, even seasoned professionals. There's a tendency to just sort of average everything out into an unrecognizable mush over time, and it takes a lot of conscious effort to push back against that.

Here are a couple tips and tricks that I've found to be helpful over the years:

Make turnarounds and model sheets. There's a reason animation/game studios do this, and it is because we are all still bad at drawing a consistent face. Despite being gainfully employed. What are we, graphic novelists?? We wish. Anyway it's a great way to familiarize yourself with your character's face from multiple angles, and it gives you a single source of truth to return to anytime you need a refresher:

Gather real-life reference. Anytime I'm designing a character I'm pulling together a ton of reference of actual people who look, to some degree, like the character in my head. It's always a collection of analogues, never just a single person, but it can be a great cheat sheet for understanding how your character might move, emote, etc:

Make a 3D model. I know it seems daunting, but with the advent of programs like Blender and Nomad Sculpt it's becoming remarkably more accessible. Heck, even James Gurney was sculpting maquettes out of clay for Dinotopia back in the day! It doesn't have to be particularly detailed—just a sort of proportionate lump will do—but it's another great way to have dynamic reference that you can rotate and light accordingly:

Practice, practice, practice. Make expression sheets for your character! Either right there on the spot, just start drawin' expressions, or you can slowly collect drawings of your character that you like, as you draw them, and compile them all in one place for your own reference. Need to draw your character's head from a weird angle? Maybe you've already drawn it before and you can copy your own homework! Doesn't count as stealing when the call's coming from inside the house 😎

I'd love to pretend there's a magical point where you can just immediately rotate your character's head in your brain like some sort of photorealistic apple in a twitter meme, but a lot of the time it's reference, hard work, and whole lotta repetition. 😐👍🏼

#ask #noodle-soupz #advice #art advice #tutorial #character design

[ramonn90]

Get access to my brushes, art tips, process videos, and files here https://www.patreon.com/ramonn90

#illustration #ramonn90 #art #photoshop #patreon #digital art #portrait #character design #brushes #game art #animeart #art fundamentals #tutorial #tips about art

[marcanimation]

'ello folks, my Cleanup tutorial is finally done and out! hope you find it useful

#Animation #Tutorial #Advice #Lesson #The Lion King #simba #animation #Disney #character design #how to #2D #traditional animation #frame by frame #Adobe #Photoshop #Animate #Flash #After Effects #Premiere #Video #Film #Drawing #Tips #Gestures #cleanup #lines #krita #toon boom #procreate #tvpaint

[catboymoments]

I’m really not sure why this took me a week but here’s a little tutorial on how I design clothes for characters ??? I hope it’s somewhat comprehensive, making tutorials can be hard for me because I have so much to say LOL

While I used a preexisting show in this example, this method can really be applied to any oc universe or story as long as you establish the basics :]

#my art #art tutorial #character design #clothing design #the owl house #toh #color theory #toh nextgen #Briar Spitzfyre #brischa

[munkiey]

Do you have any unique differences in how to draw Wukong compared to Macaque? And if so would you ever be willing to make a post on it? 👀

#art #LMK #Lego Monkie Kid #LMK Macaque #LMK SWK #LMK Sun Wukong #lmk fanart #Lego Monkie Kid fanart #Tutorial #I guess it's a tutorial #character design

[diddybu]

I love your robots!!! Do you have any advice for drawing those types of characters?

i hope that responds your questions (i didn't know what to say but then had a lot of fun doing this lol)

#illustration #character design #original character #android #gynoid #doll #tutorial #art style #comics

[capesch-arts]

Character Design tips when creating a Hijabi Muslim OC

Note: Sleeves or a head appearing is okay IN CERTAIN SITUATIONS. Like working in a garden and rolling up your sleeves OR going to the hair salon OR checking up in a hospital. In other Mazhab or fiqh, it's much more lenient and it's okay to show ankles or neck. (depends on country or Mazhab)

Note: Camel Hump hijab in certain tafsir could mean a haughty attitude rather than the camel hump shaped hijab, but there are also others that take it literally too, so it depends on the person.

#art tips #character design #hijab #muslim #islam #art #art tutorial

[banbanfan01]

talk shit about garten of banban all you want but this fucked up bird has had more of an impact on me than the entire poppy playtime franchise

#garten of banban #poppy playtime #so tempted to watch a 10 minute long unity tutorial just to make my own shitty mascot horror game #like i have designs for the characters. i could do it

[frenzyarts]

My oc Sage, who’s a witch! Also I put process images for this piece on my Patreon :3

#original character #art tutorial #witch #character design #sketch #my art #patreon #frenzy post

[raindrop-righteous]

I came to know you through face of odyssey and i wanna say i really like your character design and art in general! is there anything you keep in mind when designing characters?

i hope you dont mind this longer post im just so <33 (giggling and kicking my feet /pos)

#raindom #character design #tutorial #long post #foo #face of odyssey #thank you so much for this ask anon #this meant a lot to answer /pos

[badgertracksart]

Here's an overview of how I think about Character Clothing Concepts.

I'm not an expert in any of these areas, I just use them to drive my design decisions, researching further into choosen areas to better understand them.

Anyway, people kept asking, here it is!

#tutorial #how to #costume design #characterdesign #character design #art