Week 2 Rotation – Character Design
Single Page PDF submission
Final Character Design
Zoomed
Analysis
For this project, I used the song provided as my prompt, focussing mainly on the line: “I met a strange lady, she made me nervous”. After some experimentation, where I explored a variety of characters who encapsulated a range of aesthetics and styles, I landed on this idea: a failed ballerina. Her story consists of her childhood where she wanted to become a ballerina, and would do anything she could to get there, to the point it completely drained her physically and mentally. After years of
training, she never became good enough and had to get a regular office-type job, hence the suit and tutu combination. As this character appears quite depressed, I felt this could’ve made the singer in the song quite “nervous”, as she looks like she’s on the brink of a breakdown, especially as she does look quite unconventional.
In order to get to this character, I used some of the techniques I was taught in class. Through combining shapes together, I tried to make a less ‘classic’ woman silhouette, so that the character looked a little more unique. Regarding the colour palette, I used a small selection of quite muted and dull tones in order to reflect the mood of the character. I also made sure that the various parts of her body would be easy to separate, so that if she were to be put in motion, it would make the animation process simpler.
Overall, I’d say I’m quite happy with the result, as I like the idea and the style as it’s something I wouldn’t usually try. However, if I were to do this again, I think I’d perhaps add more detail to some areas, even though the idea was for the character to be simple, as I feel some sections are a little bare. Also, I think maybe if I varied the tones a little more, the character may’ve been stronger, as the shading at the moment is more on the subtle side
Initial rough sketches of this character
Style Influences
Initial brainstorming