How To: Character Design

    

    Hello! Welcome to another post of Cella's Cove. This is a long awaited basic post, I mean my whole blog is about character design. Not only do I love analyzing other characters in media, I like to make my own. So this time, I'm going to be giving you some tips that we keep in mind when creating a character. 

    Tip #1: Silhouettes

    Popular characters in media are often recognizable by their silhouettes. We often see these silhouettes on merchandise or in art. Batman merch is almost always recognizable unless you have been closed off from the world and modern day culture. Even if you don't know who the character is in the silhouette, you can still recognize it's shape if it is very unique. 

    Here, let's do a little test:

    Guess who the character is!

#1

#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

#7

If you didn't get all of them, that's fine! Just means you aren't as exposed to certain genres of media as others. Here are the answers:

#1 Disney Princess, Meredith.
#2 Ironman.

#3 Dobby.

#4 Godzilla.

#5 Fred Krueger.

#6 Sonic the Hedgehog.

#7 Tinkerbell

But back to the point. Silhouettes are a way of checking if your character's features are distinct and unique. Their pose speaks about their emotion and their personality. Exaggerating features can do well to make them stand out as well. A strong character can't be skinny. Make them muscles swole! 

Nature is also a great inspiration for silhouettes if you have no idea. Say you were thinking of a palm tree and wanted to make it into a character. I'm sure this is what the designer for this guy did! 

    Here, let's create a character together!

    Say you have a dog that helps his owner in the mountains, looking for a yeti. You'd have to give him a parka or some good warm clothing. Maybe a thick fur coat which could lead you to looking at dogs with fur coats. Say you come across a Chow Chow breed. Exaggerate the curly tail, rounded ears, deep black doll eyes. 

Sometimes dogs have their tongues out. Play off of that and you have a good possible pose and signature for the character: always has it's tongue out and maybe has a little running gag where the tongue has icicles on it. 

Tip #2: Colors

To continue with our yeti hunting Chow Chow, he'd need a good color palette. Coloring is also a very important factor of characters. You need to have colors that work together, fit the character and draw in the audience. 

"What colors draw in the audience?"

All colors are beautiful, but there are different names for the types of color combinations. Here's a brief chart that goes over these color combinations:

Here's good website which helps you pick these colors on your own. You can use it for many other things like a outfit palette or for art:
Paletton - The Color Scheme Designer

But if you can't really find any solid color combinations, you can always seek help from mother nature. Taking colors from nature is the easiest way to have a color combination that is good for the eyes AND works! 

Another thing I tend to use as well is cinema palettes. If mother nature isn't vibrant and freaky enough for you, seek other pieces of art for inspiration. 

Here are some examples: 

Anyways, I hope this gave you a little of a head start! I will most likely be continuing this post, maybe to make a character with you and walk you through the process! 

That's all from the cove!