To begin this semester we went back to basics and and started to break characters down by the shapes that make up their designs. For this task we were asked to break down the underlying forms and shapes that make up our favorite animated characters to show a basic understanding of character design. The three characters that came to me were The Flash (Wally West) from the Justice League animated series, Silver the Hedgehog from the Sonic the Hedgehog game series, and Gohan (Adult) from the Dragon Ball animated series. The reasons for my choices were not just that I really like the characters, but also because they were unique in their own ways. First of all, The Flash is my favorite fictional character to begin with, the Justice League series is made by Bruce Timm who also created Batman: The Animated Series and has a very distinct art style that fans will immediately recognize, thanks to the forms and shapes that make up his characters. I included Silver the Hedgehog as he has a very unique body shape to the others as he is an anthropomorphic character as is expected from a character in the Sonic the Hedgehog series which allows for him to use much more unique poses as his body will be able to deform differently to human characters. Lastly, I chose Gohan from Dragon Ball as not only was the series fresh in my head at the time, but i thought it would also be a good idea to include an American cartoon character and a Japanese anime character to find the differences in the way they use forms.
When completing this task I started to really notice the meaning in how each of these shapes and forms are used to make these characters unique in their own way, and the difference they make when trying to design characters for a particular purpose and defining their personalities. Each of the characters are different from the shapes and sizes in each of these designs and that reflects in their personality while still keeping them within the overall art style for their media they appear in.
The Flash: Justice League
Silver: Sonic the Hedgehog
Gohan: Dragon Ball Z
