Brief:

This brief is the same as the last brief but with character designs instead of environments. I am to create 100 thumbnail sketches of superheroes , these can be the same silhouette but altered or even just stances, costume designs, additional items, cosmetics ect...

I will not be linking this with my current Game Design Document (Droplets) due to the fact that I would like to branch out more. I would like to be more experimental with my drawings and ideas so have decided on superheroes.

I plan to make two or three final sketches of a single character, one in an environment to show his or her mood and another to show the different aspects of the character. Also a character sheet may be necessary to show different angles of the character. I will research into how superheroes are created and use famous illustrations for inspiration.

Research 1:

I have looked at several websites depicting comic book superheroes, some from graphic novels and others from movies and/or tv series. Below are some of the illustrations that stand out to me:

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8-Nvi1EXz11IxUIdc1a5j6yRNPIxuCQ3DkBO6TnTtzxFiSnuxgJv-_y9zwcPTVPKMhTgpGEW4M4QW0H9AXN7j0XZKPfYbW6Gx4NnGTD2KiwJSEaMaec37I_7Qj8v-QiWs37RCtPnybQI/s1600/marvel_superheroes_poster_2.jpg

Marvel comics has been in publication since 1939 and has had plenty of famous superheroes such as Spiderman, Hulk, Wolverine, Fantastic Four and Captain America. This poster shows a whole array of superheroes in comic book form, the reason I found this poster inspirational is due to the heroes stances. Even though they are all together each one has its own individual stance which depicts that character.

http://blogs.coventrytelegraph.net/thegeekfiles/dccomics1.jpg

Dc comics has been in publication since 1934 and has had just as many, if not more, note worthy superheroes as Marvel. Examples like Superman, Batman, Flash, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Aquaman and Green Arrow to name a few. This poster shows me some of the most successful characters in comic book history, I will use this as a reference into how my hero will look and feel.

Thumbnails

I have created four pages of different thumbnails, the first is stereotypical superhero poses which will be quickly drawn with stickmen to just show the difference in stances. The second is progressing from the stances of stick men to well known superheroes and their poses, this will help me see where they have been successful in the past. The third is of samurai culture to show the poses of when they are fighting, I feel this will give me a better understanding of the movement during combat. The fourth is different designs or mask, mostly my own but I am sure I will most likely end up with similar designs to well known superheroes, I have left the fifth thumbnail page for creative steps and quick ides.

Thumbnails

These are extremely simple stick men just to show some popular stances, poses or scenes that happen with Superheroes, this only took around 5 minutes. The harder part was thinking of more stances as one you have around 15 there aren't a lot more iconic poses. This gave me a better understanding in to how I should situate my character to give them the same feel.

The first half of these thumbnails was a quick attempt and drawing a simple outline of a body with weapon and then progressing that further and then into movement. I feel that this helped me understand how to situate my character in a hostile environment if needed. I quickly changed into drawing faces or not faces as with superheroes they tend to hide their identity.

Here I decided to do a couple quick drawings with Batman as the main inspiration, the reason behind this is that I want my character to have the same depth as Batman, more of a vigilante than a hero. Again I progressed on by outlining a pose of how a superhero tends to look when investigating a dark area. I started with a quick outline of the pose then progressed onto outlining into a template,

Here I used the final image of the last set of thumbnails to create a template to use with mask designs. Before I knew it I had a feature set of masks but felt that out of all of these none felt right for my character, I wanted something on the characters face to give him not only separation from the general public but a dark feel, as if he was hiding something, whether that is scars, something to do with his abilities or just to hide his abilities.

Attempt 1

I attempted to begin drawing a stereotypical superhero, with over proportioned muscles and defining body. I was happy with he progress but the more I progressed the further away my inspiration went. this was not what I wanted my character to portray. It was then I decided that my character would not be the normal all action superhero but the more timid quiet one, a new kind of hero.

Thumbnails Colour

I decided to take the mask designs and add some colour to them to see if this helped with my design issue:

I still feel the same about the masks, although I like alot of their designs they just do not fit the character that is in my head, after this I decided to do some research and before I knew it I had my idea and ti was infront of me all along...

Helmet

After looking at my helmet I had realised that this is exactly what I wanted my character to look and feel like, hiding his face behind not just a mask but a helmet that looked fierce in itself! I then began to unravel and before I knew it I had a rough concept, the idea was that he would not only just wear the helmet with a small ski mask underneath but would also ride a bike, my initial idea was a trials bike but this felt wrong, I then moved onto mountain bikes but again this just did not have the dark feel to it. Coming back from work one night I came across a gaggle of youths on their bmx's and found them very overwhelming and then i had it, put my character on a bmx. This will give my character the indie city feel that I was looking for!

Photos

I quickly used the photos I took as reference and began to draw them with photoshop, getting a rough outline as a starting point, from here it like I had finally began to create the character that I has always wanted.

I then crated a basic design and colour them as to what the character would be wearing throughout. I like the black and red design, with most superheroes there tends to be a similar theme in that there are only two or three colours. I chose these two as they show how dark the character is.

BMX

Unfortunately I lost all my progress saves or rather I saved over them repeatedly but this is my final concept for the characters BMX, this took quite around 2 days to create and took a lot of time but I am pleased with the outcome. Using the same colour theme as the character to portray that it is not only his but it is the only source of transportation for him as well.

I then created a wall for the character to be placed on, after drawing the wall I realised that it was not obvious that it was a wall, it could be a ledge or a bridge or anything but this actually gave me several ideas of where I could place the character.

I added in his bike to make it seem as though he was at least at ground height and also added in some graffiti and a texture over the wall to show the years decay, I feel this gives a decaying feel to the image and makes it a lot darker, the graffiti can be altered at any time but I was after a dark gritty feel and "NO GOD" seemed to work.

New York

I used some shots from NY, Coney Island back from my trip in 2007 that had a dark feel to it. Coney Island has a fairground that is basically deserted so tis was perfect however I felt that the clouds above were to thick and wanted it to be darker so found another photo of mine and begin editing it adding effects, erasing it and other tools.

I stuck in the current concept that I had been working on to see how it was going and immediately noticed that the character was in the wrong pose/situation so decided to take him of the wall and place him immersed in the image.

New York Final

Below is NOT the finished design but towards the end of creating this piece I found that the image, although looked great, was far too distracting from the character and drew peoples attention away. Although it had composition, starting from peoples eyes that immediately go to the bottom left where the character is situated and then continuing to the top right. This still proved to be that the image had too much going on at once.

Character Sheets

I began to create a Character Sheet that would show a few poses or movements that the character had, how he would stand, how he would look, pose ect... Below is some progress shots with how I am doing:

Model Sheet

Here is a shot of my final Model Sheet that people may use to replicate the character also to show the general feel of him.

Character Sheets

The three images below show my final character sheet but with different layouts, I was unsure with which one to use but used the 'Rule Of Three' Composition technique to decide, the first image works better as peoples eyes will start bottom left and the helmet is inline with that part, in the middle is the main stance of the character and at the top right is where the feet of the third concept begins. Therefore each individual concept hits the composition perfectly.