Last month I participated in an online character design workshop, taught by Anne Hoberg. It consisted of two modules; design principles and acting & posing.

In the first module we got to learn all about how to construct appealing characters and breaking it down into basic design principles.

We were assigned homework to finish three characters: a protagonist, sidekick and antagonist.

I quickly got stuck when I tried to draw the characters out of nothing, directly onto the paper. So, I grabbed a pile of old newspapers and started cutting out different textures and shapes to create basic 'collages' of the rough forms each character had at its essence. This helped me a lot in building upon those foundations while trying out different styles to find what works.

{{< figure src="/img/drawings/2022-03-05/chardesign_sketches_main_web.jpg" caption="Protagonist; a timid youngster with a curious heart" >}} {{< figure src="/img/drawings/2022-03-05/chardesign_sketches_side_web.jpg" caption="Sidekick: a friendly giant, slightly older" >}} {{< figure src="/img/drawings/2022-03-05/chardesign_sketches_anta_web.jpg" caption="Antagonist; a trickster type, ambiguous like nature can be" >}}

Anne gave some wonderful feedback on these designs, which I implemented into the final line up of the characters:

{{< figure src="/img/drawings/2022-03-05/chardesign_lineup_web.jpg" caption="Full line up, after Anne's feedback" >}}

I will write a seperate post on the second module of the workshop, including drawings of these characters in various poses and interacting with each other.