7 posts tagged “original character design”
Extending on the 8 Ball Crew's home town. Not sure where I'm going with it but the overall concept is growing. Suggestions welcome!! Also I've added a detail shot of the imp character, I pushed this one pretty hard in terms of Illustrator. It was a lot of fun! Also producing the 8 Ball and Radioactive Broadcast Logo / Graphics, this little project is taking on a life of it's own!
Here's another character that fit's squarely in with Diablomas, Speedballer is the title character's sidekick and co-conspirator. She's a cross between Pauley Perrette and Rollerball (the original movie from 1975 not the souless remake), with a little extra punk rock thrown in for fun (hence the green hair).
The other day I found a spare few bucks and splashed out on a black cartridge sketch book, of course there's plenty of artists that work on black paper etc, but this is a little new to me, I haven't worked on black paper since art school and that was overly structured (only use this technique on this subject matter etc type of project).
Overall I was pleasantly surprised by two things, the price of the exercise, the 90 page book was only $8.00 and the color pencils and paint pens weren't too expensive either and working on black stretched me a little in the way only stepping outside of your comfort zone can.
For the uninitiated, the trick is to stop yourself trying to fill everything in, I've spent many a zen like hour cloaking my drawings and character designs in a range of blacks, with this method you find out pretty quickly that adding too much kills all of your contrast and makes things look muddy.
The white paint pens need to be applied super sparingly, but make for great hot-spots and it doesn't take too much effort to build up a bit of colour really quickly. Plus you can do shiny or x-ray effects without too much effort.
So here's the pluses I've found through my little experiment: -
- Black sketch books look ultra cool.
- Once you get your head around the change in rules, it's pretty quick and easy to build up some pleasing effects.
- It was all super cheap to get, no specialist art-supplier required.
Great for a change of pace, (but I still prefer white cartridge paper).
Now just to set the record straight, my little example study of a red haired dominatrix girl with a mutant octopus is by no means a great feat in art or character design, but I do think it came out pretty cool considering I went in without a plan of any kind.
Also for the people who read my blog semi-regularly, no I'm not all prevy, demented and into sub and dom stuff (not that there's anything wrong with it when it's between two consenting adults who respect one another!!!), I did however see Chrissy Amphlett on the TV tonight, as the Divinyls have reformed, so I'm going with that!
Sorry, really can't think of anything remotely explaniatory to say about the octopus, apart from that I am a little weird!
Another hand drawn start to photoshop mashed finish. Barry was based on a guy I saw at a bus stop, he was a dis-interested, rough as guts looking guy with a big gut and bloated stomach, after watching his slothful movements for a short while,it struck me that you can't judge a book by it's cover and from there I wound up with a character that was a modern renaissance man.
Yeah I know, I'm a little odd....
This would be my 'Muttpop' project for lack of a better term, with a character based comic and the lead character for a vinyl series.
Introducing, 'Diablomas' agent provocateur. Maybe at a later date I'll add some more images of him and give his background info, probably at a time when, unlike now, I don't need to be asleep!!!