Sugar Prohibition
World Overview
In a world where sugar has been prohibited by law, it is up to detective Mo Lars to infiltrate the dark underbelly of New York and bring the culprits responsible for the sugar trade to justice. He looks to a local speakeasy jazz singer for information – she must know something about the elusive Pablo Chocolatebar. Word on the street says he frequents the speakeasy often to meet with his goons.
Class exercise
We had to use circles, squares and triangles to create characters. I chose to use a mix of all three for each of mine. Number 1’s face shape is a square, number 2 is a triangle and number 3 is a circle. This makes the three characters look very different from each other.
This exercise made me realise how effective variation in shapes are to creating a character – round features make a character seem trustworthy and likeable where pointy shapes make a character appear evil. If I have already established a characters’ personality, I can use a mix of different shapes to compliment that. I will use what I have learned from this task when I begin visualising characters for this world.
Characters
I will design some characters for the story as my team and I had discussed, and I will make sure to keep in mind what I have learned in class to use different shapes and sizes for my characters. The team and I came up with some mood boards that we can use to come up with more characters.
Sugar Kane
Sugar Kane is a Jazz Singer who is later revealed to be the true kingpin who overlooks the sugar trade. She is a powerful character who stays one step ahead of the detective. I chose to give her sharp shoulders and chin to reflect this.
She wears classy 1930’s jazz singer dresses and has a mysterious, sultry personality which plays into her femme fatale character. She successfully fools Mo into thinking she’s an innocent bystander to what happens in the speakeasy and manages her business while he is directed to dead ends. Her favourite drink is a Scotch on the rocks and in her free time she fills in newspaper Sudoku games.
After designing some T poses, I drew some concepts to see what she might be like in person.
I think my choice of round features works well for this character because in the story she is a trustworthy innocent character, and it comes as a shock to the audience when they discover she is actually the mastermind behind the sugar trade operation.
Pablo Chocolatebar
Pablo Chocolatebar is supposedly the mob boss responsible for the illegal trade of sweets during the Sugar Prohibition.
He is a large and powerful man, much like Kingpin in the Spider-Verse, and his figure reflects that. Being the ring leader of organised crime in New York, he is a mysterious character who’s personal life remains largely unknown to Mo Lars. In reality, Pablo is a very anxious and terrified of his superior – Sugar Kane. In his free time he likes to water his flower arrangements.
Mo Lars
We used the character design template document to navigate what the detective character’s personality and mannerisms might be. His name is Mo Lars to relate back to teeth, he’s a family man from New York and has a hobby of collecting jazz records. He came from a family of criminals and broke away from that lifestyle with the help of a policeman, whom he aspires to be like someday. Family is everything – he’s emotional and impulsive but his traditional values mean he does a good job of hiding them to stay professional.
I chose to give Lars big circular ears to hint that he is a bookish character, and a long rectangular face because he is reasonable and trustworthy. I also gave him a silly long torso with his trousers pulled up high because I get the feeling he is slightly gullible and trusts others a little too much. To improve this design I could source more reference images to understand how a long blazer would look on a character.
Other characters
I had an idea for a shifty character who sells sweets illegally after our team was brainstorming concepts for a gang that sells sweets. I gave him pointy features and a skinny body to hint that he is not a trustworthy character.
I sourced my reference image from Pinterest which inspired my sketch below.
I moved his hand so it’s by his side rather than obstructing his mid section as I thought it would make his character easier to read.