the bane of my existence

This one single character design has been a source of very much frustration to me. Here's a thought; the top 4 shows of the past 20 years (The Simpsons, South Park, Family Guy, and King Of The Hill) are all horribly designed. Just goes to show that how important good character design is in a show; which is to say, not very much. The most important aspects of a show are excellent writing, clearly defined characters, strong direction, a clear vision, and good stories with good dialog. And of course it has to be FUNNY!!
What is NOT important, and a waste of time, money, and energy; is when you worry about unimportant, nit-picking details in the design. No body is going to care if Homer Simpson has 2 hairs on his head or 3 or 4. No one is going to stop watching Family Guy if Meg Griffin was designed with square glasses instead of round glasses. No one is going think South Park is any less funny if Cartman's double chin line was removed.
Not to say all shows can get away with bad designs. But you need to know what is important in each specific show you work on.

cut out girls

I haven't been posting as diligently as I normally do. 3 reasons; 1-I was at the Ottawa Animation Festival for a week. 2- I got back from the festival and was sick with a horrible flu that I am just getting over now. 3- BURN OUT. I have been working on a number of projects over the past year and I need a break to clear my head. I have a lot of stuff I could post from this Mythology project still. So here are several cut outs of some of the females in the series.

hockey player notes

This was one of the earlier characters designed. As you can see, compared to the characters in the previous posts, this design is way off. I had the designers completely re-designed him, unlike the others characters which only needed tweeking. I hope my notes help anyone looking at my blog, as much as they helped the character designers on this production.

more notes

The designers were getting a much better understanding of the "stlye" at this point. This character needed very little tweeking.

mermaid notes

My notes again to the character designers, mostly stressing the importance of straight lines and curved lines.

my design notes

These are my notes to the character designers. The top image was not in the right "style" of the show. So I had the designer make a few tweeks and we have an incidental character design that fits with the look of the rest of the show. The designers told me that my notes were very helpful.

caricature

Just a caricature done with a blue pencil and PANTONE TRIA MARKERS.

a kid's a kid

I needed to design a kid character. The first one I did, on the far left, was kinda a metal kid from the 80's; looks pretty much like I looked in the 80's, the hair, the braces, the awkwardness. They felt he looked to old, more like a teen than a kid. So I put some shorts on him. They liked the long legs, but wanted him a lot smaller and younger. So I shrunk him down and gave him a shirt his Mom would buy, I also gave him freckles to look younger. Then finally they wanted the metal kid but small, so I came up with the final one on the right. Bingo!

muffler

I did a few minor tweeks to this character. I added a metal ring where his neck meets his body and a small bolt lower on his body, and a muffler. I can imagine puffs of smoke coming out of the muffler when his engine sputters. I also put a visor cap on him, not sure why, I just thought he needed something there. He's a pretty strange creature, part bird, part man, part machine.

Maori art

It's not a perfectly authentic look, there just isn't a lot of info on Maori art. Looks good anyway.

indian art

Updated pic above.

Ever since I was a kid I was fascinated by the art of the native Indians. I remember going on a field trip in grade school, to look at Indian art. I had a sketch book and I drew the totem poles and I was in awe of the art. So when the chance came up in a production that we are near the end of to draw something in the tradition of Indian art, I jumped at the chance. I may do some photoshop work to it now, experiment with a filter or a texture.

rough sketches of previous posts

My two favorite COL-ERASE pencils are 20043 BROWN and 20067 PURPLE. I love sketching with those colors. Most animators are so used to sketching with blue that they don't even try other colors. Traditionally non photo blue was used way back in the day when we used film and cameras. In this digital era there really is no reason to stick to blue.

another rejected design

Very much a Bruce Timm and Shane Glines influence here.

rejected character

This design was rejected, she's too innocent looking. My inspiration for her is Avril Lavigne.

same head, different body

Personally, I think the track suit is funnier.