Minor Project:O'Barney Orthographs

Fig 1: Final Design for O'Barney

Fig 2: O'Barney Body Orthographs

Fig 3:O'Barney Head Orthographs 

From the feedback I received on the previous post, this is the final result for O'Barney. In the orthographs for the head I included an unhooded O'Barney to help in understand how the hood of his raincoat would Rest on his head.

Minor project: O'Barney Continuing Design

Fig 1: Continuing Designs for O'Barney by Exploring Body Types

Here are some more concepts for O'Barney, coming off from the Interim Crit where admittedly he was my least thought out design of the three bogeymen characters I went and re-evaluated his design and played with some body types, as well as some raincoat and macintosh designs from around the 1980's which is the time when Matthew, the person I got the description of O'Barney, would of been a child. While i liked the idea of him having a blank stare I felt like that restricted the character a little so while I kept the round eyes I made him look more angry and threatening.

Minor Project: Mr Polo Final Design and Orthographs

Fig 1: Finalised Design for Mr Polo

Fig 2: Head Orthographs

Fig 3: Body Orthographs

Fig 4: Additional notes for Mr Polo's Scarf

This is my finalised design for the character of Mr Polo for my Project. His design is significantly simple in comparison to Mr Plimsoll, he doesn't have visible legs, something that would be a challenge to create in 3D, however due to the description on the character mentioning how he appears to "glide along" I felt like it was a direction suitable to the character. Although, as I go about the modelling process, I might widen the end of his coat slightly just to allow for minor leg motion when it comes to rigging. As well as this I wasn't sure if I should include a mouth on him or not, considering his face is mostly covered with his jumper and scarf I didn't think it would be too necessary to include one. However if I do end up giving him a mouth I would probably add it in 2D as a time saver instead of modelling a mouth that would barely be seen.

My main concerns over modelling this character mainly revolves around how to model his eyes and the process of making his scarf despite the fact that I was able to make one in my previous project.

Minor Project: Mr Plimsoll Final Design and Orthographs

Fig 1: Finalise Design for Mr Plimsoll

Fig 2: Body Orthographs

Fig 3: Head Orthographs

Minor Project: Mr Polo Continuing Design

Fig 1: The Two Designs that were most popular from the Second Character Concept Post

From the feedback provided for my previous post about Mr Polo, these two designs were the most popular, however I got feedback in that while these two concepts are the most successful in understanding the description given for him, they still weren't that creepy or monstrous. 

From being giving this feedback I went back and looked at how could I make this character look scary while keeping the round features that were key to the character. I looked at some Popeye the Sailor cartoons featuring the character Wimpy, one of my influences for this character and found that in the short movie "Shiver Me Timbers" that Wimpy's eyes open when scared which is in some way a bit disturbing. How skeletons and ghosts are portrayed in 1930's cartoons also picked my fancy due to how the "eyes" on those characters appear to be empty by how they apply black to the circle of the eye, similar to shading the end of a cylinder at a 3/4 view. 

Fig 2: Characters that helped influence the creepiness in Mr Polo
(Wimpy from Popeye the Sailor (Image from the animation "Shiver Me Timbers" 1934), Skeleton from the Tom & Jerry animation "Wot a Night", 1931, and a ghost from the game Cuphead)

With these ideas I got to making some designs, based on the 2 original designs from the previous post, and started to mess around with this idea of empty eye sockets and just complete large black eyes in general and seeing how they look with the character. I feel like number 2 I was more happy to play around with his body but I also like number 4 for the fact that only certain expressions would show that concept off however my only concern would be about how expression would he be to allow him to show emotions like surprise or anger to allow for his eyes to show fully? 

Fig 3: Continuation of the Designs including Addition Notations

Minor Project: Mr Polo Character Concept 2

Fig 1: Mr Polo Character Concepts

I went over my designs for Mr Polo from the previous post and attempted to incorporated clothing to his design. Based on his description on being wrapped up in wool and the part of how he seemed to glide instead of walk, I experimented with some ideas that would incorporate those features. I still think that he needs more work to be creepy but I feel like number 3 and 8 are more on the way to be creepy. While 6, suits the style a little better then the others but he doesn't entirely suit the characteristic I was given. However I feel as though his body shape is one that I would like to explore further upon.

Minor Project: Mr Polo Character Concept- Body Types

I'm still in the process of thinking about what clothes to give Mr Polo, so here are a series of concepts depicting different body types. I think that in the final design his feet wouldn't be shown, to help in visualizing the idea of how he looked like he glided along instead of actually walked, however feet have been drawn here to help in understanding what body shape feel more suited to his character. It was hard making him look monstrous as he was described as being round and baby-like but I feel as though I made some progress in capturing some sense of creepiness from some of the facial expressions in some of the design concepts.

Minor Project: O'Barney Character Concept

Fig 1: O'Barney Character Concepts

For O' Barney I want to go for a large character with a big upper half and and smaller lower half. While I feel as though I have achieved what I was going for, I think that I could of worked on more diversity on the types of body to prevent it from looking samey. However I think that facial expression wise I think that I have been able to achieve different looks in most of the designs, each showing different personalities related to the description given to me of O'Barney's character.

Minor Project: Character Concepts- Mr Plimsoll 2

Fig 1: Mr Plimsoll's Concept Art

In response to the feedback I was given in my earlier Mr Plimsoll's concept art post, I went over the design for Mr Plimsoll, the main goal in making him look sinister which was something That I lacked in the older post. I also played around with one body in the other post of him having a hunched back and played with how extreme I could get it to be. I feel like my knowledge of the period of animation style that I am trying to go for has improved from the past post and I think that I have a better understanding of how far you can take characters when drawing in this style.

Minor Project: Character Influences

Here are three influence maps for the three bogeymen that I would like to focus on for this project:

Fig 1: Mr Plimsoll's Influence Map

For Mr. Plimsoll I first looked at examples of old men in 1930's cartoon, such as the titular character from the Betty Boop animated short "The Old Man of the Mountain" and Miser from "Little Dutch Mill". From there I looked at examples of both old men and long legs from other sources. As one of the key features of Mr. Plimsoll is his long legs and large feet I look at birds such as cranes and the shoebill stork. This was because they have the delicate long legs that look creepy as well as the ratio of body to leg is what I am trying to achieve with the character. As well as this I looked at snapping turtles as well for the way they extend there neck is similar to a person with a hunched back, which fits into the description I was given about Mr Plimsolls. In general what I was looking for as influence for this character was a lanky build,  which is why characters like Olive Oyl and Jack Skellington as examples, as well as old characters or extreme facial expressions that fit with who Mr Plimsolls is as a Bogeyman character.

Fig 2: O'Barney's Influence Map

O'Barney's influences are mainly revolving around large characters with big torsos and small legs. As the one thing I got from his story was the fact that he was violent and did a number of violent acts such as punch through a front door i felt that it was appropriate to assume that his arms would be big, like a gorilla. There are quite a lot of examples of large characters present in early cartoons including Pete from "Steam Boat Willie", Fearless Fred from the Betty Boop series of animations, Bluto from the Popeye series and others. I didn't so rely on other sources for O'Barney due to the this type of character being rather prevalent in this period of animation however I did have a look into later examples such as the genie boss, Dijimmi the Great, and the pirate boss, Captain Brineybeard from the 2017 game Cuphead, a game that is heavily influence by this style of animation. As well as that example I also looked at big animals such as bears and gorilla for influence on how to exaggerate O'Barney's features.  

Fig 3: Mr Polo's Influence Map

The Influences for Mr Polo mainly revolved around him looking round and soft like a baby despite being an adult. Looking at 1930s cartoons, I was trying to find characters that had a bald circular design, such as Grampy from Betty Boop, The Goon and Wimpy from The Popeye Series of animations, Porky Pig from Looney Tunes was also featured for his circular childish characteristic and also Dr Dekapan from Osomatsu-kun was included for his body shape. Also due to his affiliation with plants in his description I also looked at plants and mushrooms that have a dome like appearance. I looked into aquatic creatures like the blobfish and jellyfish for a similar reason. I also looked at Wooden and China Dolls because I want to give Mr Polo a sense of the uncanny and I feel like Dolls allow for that.

Minor/Major Project: Mr Plimsolls Concept Art

Fig 1: Head Concept for Mr. Plimsolls

Fig 2: Body Concepts for Mr. Plimsolls

Here are some initial head and body concept art for Mr. Plimsolls in the style of the 1930's. I have decided to go down the route of the surreal cartoon style of early animation, influenced by the early Walt Disney and the Fleischer Studio cartoons. I decided upon this style because I like the appeal of the style and there is a lot more to work here then with my other style choice. Because the animation at the time was very experimental, it lead to very bizarre and, in a way, scary cartoon shorts and because of this I feel as though this style would fit with my theme of childhood bogeymen very well.

Feedback on this post would be most welcome.

Adaptation B: Ludlow Final Character Concept

Based on the feedback from both the style concepts and from the pitch I decided to go into further development into the version 3 of Ludlow. From here I would then start to break down the character to see how different expressions would look, the clothes he wears and how he would act before finally modelling him in 3D in Maya

Adaptation B: Style Concept for Ludlow and Joe

Fig 1: Concepts of styles for Ludlow

Fig 2: Concepts of styles for Joe

Some digital concepts of style ideas for the two characters varying from somewhat realistic to a more cartoon style. Basing the general attributes of the characters from their descriptions in the book as well as using influences like otters for Ludlow's head and face shape in one of the designs.

Adaptation B: Initial Concepts

Fig 1: Ludlow

Fig 2: Joe Zabbidou

Here are some Initial drawings for the two characters from "The Black Book of Secrets" I'm style experimenting with the style I want to go for and trying to figure out how to make the two characters relatable to each other. Clothing wise I've decided to go with a more Victorian style however due to Joe's known habit of travelling for his job as a Secret Pawnbroker I'd imagine that he wouldn't be in a stereotypical English suit. Ludlow on the other hand is a poor boy from the City so him wearing the chimney sweep boys clothes of shirt, overalls and a larger then him coat would suit to drive the point that he is more and make the silk scarf he stole at the beginning of the book more prominent. I want to use the character descriptions from the beginning of the book when the two characters meet for the first time as that has the most description.

Character Project: Character Bible

Character Presentation by Katie Lima on Scribd

Reflective Statement

Overall I feel as though this project went over quite well, I had trouble in the beginning finding a way for my art style to compliment both characters and the advice from Justin was both interesting and insightful for being able to move forward and improve. I wish that I had more time to figure out perspectives a little more as I had continuous issues when designing the Dinosaur couple's kitchen for the end of the scene so I'd like to have more practise in drawing in that was as well as drawing reptilian creatures like dinosaurs as well.

Character Project: Colour Comps

Fig 1: Smart Guys Colour Comps

Fig 2: Silly Guys Colour Comps

Character Project: OGR 7/11/16

OGR 7/11/16 by Katie Lima on Scribd

Character Design Week 3: Sci-fi Victorian Era

Figure 1: Research on Victorian dresses and Initial Sketch

Figure 2: Without the fan in front of her face and the fan itself

Figure 3: Quick sketch of the dress

Figure 4: Sketch of Victorian Era Sci-fi Alien

For this project I was given the Victorian Era and to use it to influence a Sci-fi character. For my character I did a beautiful alien that would prey on humans, who'd draw men in with her gorgeous face only to reveal that her lower face is grotesque and that her hands are elongated claws. I based her outfit on early Victorian Era dresses where a V-shaped bodice and small waist was popular, as well as the bell pagoda sleeves that I thought would be good to hide how weird and monstrous her hands actually are. Her waist is tiny and based on how the Victorian women would use corsets to achieve a small waist and big dresses with large boning to emphasise large hips which was very fashionable in the early 1800s.

Character Design Week 2: 3 Pirate Characters

Fig 1: Initial Ideas

Figure 2: Going into more detail on the hero girl pirate and the villain rich guy

Figure 3: Continuation

Character Design: Mary Poppins/Neanderthal

Fig 1

Fig 2

Fig 3

Fig 4

This challenge to take aspects from a known character and put it onto a type of generic character, was difficult at the start, for my characters they were Mary Poppins and Neanderthal. At the start I just drew Mary Poppins in a sort of caveman attire. Then I started to think more of what her character is and added elements of that, making her classy Victorian fashion was made into a modest fur dress and her umbrella and magic bag is now a stick and fur sack that she takes with her while wanderer to cave to cave.