Week 1 – Character Creation Course and References

For out first proper week back we jumped right into out first course, creating our own character and learning about the pipeline for character creation used in the industry. There will be two parts to this, creating the actual character as well as a reflective blog. We were given a helpful and clear idea of when we should have the ideas for our character finalized and when we should start modelling.

We were talked through the technical aspects of what to think about when making a character, how would they move around the world, would they have clothes or equipment, the colour and size, if they had any predators and how to defend themselves etc.

We were also given some direction about anatomy. One of the most helpful things they said was that our characters, especially if we were making something more fantasy leaning, did  not need to be realistic but did need to be logical given the context of the world. We were shown some examples of fantasy and sci-fi creatures and how they didn’t make sense. Either they wouldn’t be able to keep their balance while moving or the bone structure was too restrictive.

We were also told the importance of a good silhouette, I think when I first start sketching out my character I’ll start with the silhouette then build from that. Part of our final submission has to be a PureRef sheet of reference images which I’ve already started.

Finally we started learning a bit about the pipeline of character creation as well as Henry’s tips for successful characters.