Targets!

Targets, apparently. Yay, artistic progression and all that.

• Finish those character illustrations for the model sheet, and make the model sheet look very fancy with a theme which looks like a set of blue prints.
• Learn some modelling in Cinema4D since I'm going to have to use it to animate and create a 3D version of my character
• Analyze hats, the character needs one. Also because hats are cool, and it needs to look like a hat.

DONE.

Working the Scumscene

Recently did a logo for a really good website, UK Scumscene is a site which deals in metal and rock music within the UK and aims to give information, reviews and generally support the scene.
I was asked to make a new logo for the site with some custom typography rather than faffing about with fonts, which I thought was a really good idea because I really wanted to hand draw the font, which I ended up doing!

The first attempt came out not so well, I used a few references but I wasn't too skilled at making spiky metal font which is what thew site required.

 I wanted to include the Union Jack because I thought UK and all that, it would probably help to add a motif, also the use of only like 3 colours really appealed to me, the font it's self wasn't so great because when I shoved it through Illustrator it came out looking less metal and more cartoony, so I decided to scrap it and make something better.
In the meantime, I also thought of a new idea for the background. Keeping the 3 colour theme, I decided to create a two-tone union jack in red and black which would have white lettering to make it pop out against the dark background.
I used the old font which I'd vectorized as a placeholder because I hadn't created the new one yet, suffice to say it really made me glad I went for something different because I wasn't happy with it.
It was a nice idea, not what we went with but it was a step towards the final design.

I then finally came up with a font which I thought would look more appropriate for the image of the site, I was given the instructions to grunge the font up to make it really distressed which thankfully I was able to do in Illustrator which means that if it's scaled up it'll keep the grunge. Lewis, who runs the site came up with the idea that the stripes should still be used and decided that if they too were grunged that it would help to compliment the type. The black lettering and red stripes against a black background was reversed essentially, with the red still in the same place and it came out looking much better thanks to it.

UK Scumscene is owned and ran by Lewis Clark and aims to keep the UK scene for Rock and Metal music thriving.

Cheers to Lewis for asking me to do the logo, it really is a good site and should totally be checked out if you're into Metal or Rock. Looking forward to seeing more from the site, as it's starting to gain a well-deserved reputation! You can pop over to them at This link, right here.

Character Design: Tracing in Adobe illustrator

Recently we've been designing characters which will eventually culminate in an animated 3D model, but before that, we've been told to create a model sheet to show the character off in 2D.
To do this, I've had to create using illustrator to ink the character sketches for the final design.

Taking sketches from photoshop, I had to import them into Illustrator and ink them in. The result on the front model came out looking very tidy compared to how it would if I drew up the inks in Photoshop, which given he's a robot would probably be more appropriate than looking very sketchy. The process took much longer than it would have in other programs, but the results are decent enough that I think it was worth using. The basic inks were also masked off so that it appears cleaner when it was imported into photoshop and coloured up.

When brought into photoshop I applied basic shading to the character, I thought about giving very painted shading but given it's a robot I wanted very simple shading to make it look a bit cleaner than I do more organic characters. The bit which I really enjoy about colouring this character is that I was able to use some textures to try and give an impression that he's made of metal. I created a brushed metal texture in photoshop which I applied to the grey areas in addition to finding a fabric texture on the net which was applied over the top of the hat. Overall I think the character's come out looking alright, I'm tempted to go back and alter the shading of the character later but I would say that the inks at least have came out looking rather tidy and uniform thanks to the straight lines Illustrator is able to make.

UPDATE: Decided on some new shading, looks much more detailed and less like someone used the burn tool. looks slightly more cinematic and also has details on the tubing and the brush on the end of the character's hand.

Character design: Lovely references.

The Big Book of Character Design features a collection of contemporary character design from a plethora of different artists. The amount of different styles is very large and there are several examples which I quite liked:

This example is Charu Chan is one I like the simplicity of, the expression is fun and the design is something different. Visually it's appealing just because it seems as if it's trying to achieve what it is, a cute character.

The addition of the sweets and fruit on the top of her head adds to the cute factor which I think the artist is trying to enforce.

Overall this character shows that minimalism can produce really nice looking characters, in a very similar vein to Hello Kitty, as it looks nice without needing to add tons of detail which I don't really think would make the character as relatable because there would be too much to it.

The fact it's bright also helps because it's a character that's designed to be bright and happy which is something I quite like simply because bright and happy things are cool, simple as.

This character "Kyle" was created by Jared Nickerson, part of the reason that I really like it is because when I first saw it, it took me a few minutes to work out that it was actually CGI and not a toy. The design is quirky and the amount of detail which the artist has went into, right down to the surface texture of the bomb, really makes this character look great. The addition of the mustache is a good addition because it adds to the personality of the character.

I went and looked into some of Jared Nickerson's other artwork and was really pleased with the 2D art which I found the work is again, very bright and colourful but the shading is also really good looking and the work just gives a real air of professionalism.

A lot of the work appeals to me because I'm very much influenced by cartoons and an almost Japanese graffiti style which I'm a big fan of, particularly in the piece he created known as "Atomic Lollipop". I love the bright, vibrant colours of Nickerson's 2D work and to be honest, it's the sort of thing I'd wear on a t-shirt.

Ariefoort is a character designed by Pixelkaiju, and the reason I like his design is the fact that he's a physical model (or... plush) and I like the idea that characters can be designs to be a physical item which can be picked up. This appeals to me because a character which you can pick up adds to the realism of a character and gives it more dimension. It's a nicely designed and the fact it's made out of material and textiles may well be part of the characters design and this is just the natural way the character was intended to be presented, but in an age where everything is drawn or modelled and then presented digitally, it's nice to see a more traditional approach to designing a character. 

The original design of the character is alright, but I would say that a character designed to be a doll hand-drawn looks a litte bit creepy, so personally I think the character looks less unsettling when it's presented as a toy or a doll or a plush.