Thursday 6 October 2016

CHARACTER SKETCHES #1

Thursday 6 October 2016
When it comes to narrowing down the design of our main character, I decided to look at wildlife as a visual reference. Originally I looked at b-movie monsters/costumes as that's a theme that Norma Green is inspired by, however I felt to get a more original concept I should look at primary sources like animals and nature.

Tentacles


Julien had suggested that Norma's hair could be tentacles, as it fits with the sci-fi theme and also saves us from using nhair in Maya. Also we had thought about tentacle legs for Norma, and she would move around almost like a snail, maybe with the tentacles moving at the same time however this is something we plan to speak with Alan about, so nothing is concrete quite yet.


Eyes



To fit in with Norma's alien look, I imagine her eyes to be very dark. Though I'd like to narrow down on the patterns her eyes have, as I think that completely black eyes can sometimes look a bit dead. I focused mainly on nocturnal animals and creatures when looking for visual references.


 Hands



Seeing that this character has tentacles for legs, it may look a bit strange for her to have human hands. When sketching her hands I referenced from tropical breeds of frogs and amphibians. One of the most well known b-movie monsters of all time, the swamp monster, was heavily based off from amphibians. I also didn't want to reference from generic alien drawings as that may result in the character designs looking generic.


These sketches are all very rough, nothing is set in stone yet, so it would be great to have some feedback.

2 comments:

  1. all sane, sensible ideas here - eyes-wise, you're right, if she's completely black, she'll look either evil or as if she's been possessed or replaced by an evil sexbot...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_0y_BGIZSU

    big dilated pupils are an indicator of sexual arousal, so maybe that's a clue as to where to go in this regard. As long as her eye-colour is suitably 'alien', I think you could keep them on the human-side of some your examples here.

    Hair-wise - love the little detail of the suckers on the underside of her hair.

    In terms of her frock, the tentacles just seem like a must to me because they allow you to give her that hour-glass shape. I don't know if you're fans of Mad Men, or if you've watched it, but Joan might be a great additional reference in terms of old school sex appeal and curvaceousness - what a sex siren!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNSawUi-vUA
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWn1TFFgsxE

    I guess Norma Green could sort of 'ripple/hover' across the floor - a sort of sexier version of the mushrooms and/or the floating twirling flowers?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzCUEQxOT3U (at about 3 mins).

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  2. but all of that said, I do think she needs to be 'b-movie' enough so not soooo sophisticated that the joke isn't there anymore. You may know this already:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKPLQbl44as

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