Have you ever felt stuck? Creating similar art to your reference or inspiration or maybe even drawing the same thing over and over? One of my mentors, Catia Chen, challenged me to think about exploring my own style through breaking with my old habits. One tool we discussed was breaking things!
Thinking about how you design your characters is another extension of your voice. Circle, triangle, square are the basic shapes that most character designs come from, what if we exaggerated it? Or pushed it to it’s limits where the character sits on the edge of being believable. Experimenting with these shapes and concepts helps me to loosen up and PLAY. And play helps me get into my own art flow which then allows me to create pieces unique to my voice.
I’m experimenting with a short short story where the main character is a duck. Ducks make me think of the Hans Christian Andersen’s Danish tale The Ugly Duckling, a story of a late blooming transformation which seamlessly triggers thoughts of my own awkward adolescence.
I am keeping the shapes round with curves and short straight lines to give the design contrast. Something that was common in mid-century animation character designs. This character is sweet, kind maybe slightly naive. The roundness of his body helps to convey this characteristic. His stylized neck is purposefully awkward.
GUACHE STABILO PENCILS AND PAPER
Next, I will be putting Little Duck into scenes to explore his mood through color and lighting.