Inspiration Haven

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Hello! Firstly, thanks so much! I love character design but I’m trying to get much better at it, especially with painting. I can try to give some advice on what teachers/professional artists have said and that I definitely know to be true:

1. Every single physical trait a character has should show their backstory/who they are. For example, don’t just add a cool looking scar to a character because you think it’s cool. Add one if it adds more depth to their backstory! Everything on the character should be there for a reason.

2. Silhouette concepts are my favorite part in the design because it allows you to quickly explore a lot of clothing, armor, body shapes, etc. Having a pose makes the character have more of an exciting silhouette to look at as well (this is something I need to do better on because I love neutral poses hahaha).

3. Alright I’m gonna go on a rant about the importance of using reference here: make sure you have a TON references to draw from before you start a character! Many of my teachers require that students come in with pages filled with photo refs before they start any drawing. The better researched your costuming/props/etc. is the better your drawing will be! This was one of the many reference pages I created for my sci-fi Chinese mafia project, for example:

For some reason a lot of people think that pasting photo refs onto your PS canvas and referencing them is “cheating.” That is just SILLY. Obviously people shouldn’t trace an image nor should they copy the photo pixel by pixel when making original work (that just makes the learning process slower). But the more stuff you look at while drawing the better your stuff gets. And as you get more confident with drawing, you can deviate more and more from the reference (ex. combining more than one pose together, changing the colors, lighting, etc.). Here are the references I used for a hitchhiker character:

A lot of my character stuff is referenced from movie screenshots, and this is because the characters in films move so the reference gets a bit more… elusive/hard to notice? My final cover art was referenced from a scene in Scarface, because no way am I wasting precious time and energy to try to guess how to draw complex clothing folds and etc. when I can pump out a better piece in half the time by looking at reference:

Make sure to draw from life as well! Drawing people everywhere you go gives you a broader sense of the endless possibilities of characters you can make.

Anyways, I hope this helped and that I didn’t rant on for too long! ^o^ Have fun!