Lately, I’ve been doing some character design for a couple of projects, some commissioned and some personal. Below, you can see some examples.
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Tag: Sketch
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
It was Thursday yesterday. So it was that day of the week on which we throwback to, well, old shit we’ve already posted. Anyway. I was looking through some old sketches and I came across these cutesy princesses. I didn’t feel like resharing them since I never really liked them in the first place — I do think they had potential, though –, so instead I decided on revamping their design concept.
In other news, I did another Shape Challenge which spurred my creativity.
Finally, I’m currently working on — you guessed it! — yet another makeover for portfolio purposes. I know there isn’t much to show yet, but for those who are interested in seeing how I start off my work process…
Shape of the Week: Return of the Gnome
I haven’t done much drawing for the past few days since I was bent on finishing reading Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. It’s a great read with imaginative, inspiring characters in it — like, for instance, industrial remade chimeras, sapient talking birdmen, and human-like women with chitinous heads. But yesterday it came to me that, arguably, the greatest of all characters is New Crobuzon, the city in which the story takes place. I say ‘arguably’ but it seems pretty clear to me that Mieville spent more time fleshing out its background, history, politics, demography, etc., than detailing or explaining the characters — bar one exception, perhaps. So the city becomes more than just a backdrop, it becomes an active agent in the story… Anyway, why am I telling you all this? Well, here’s the thing, I was thinking of ‘cartoonifying’ some of the book’s characters. I thought of how to draw machinery, feathers, and city scapes. And then I went on thinking… and thinking… And during all that time, the (digital) canvas remained empty. Which brings me to the point of this post.
Today I decided to ‘kickstart’ myself, again. But instead of going through my usual routine — participating in a design contest, always against my better judgment — I decided to partake in a challenge set by Mallory Carlson at the Nickelodeon Artist Program. Let me tell you, it has been a fun experience. Not only did it get me drawing again, it’s also been really inspiring to see what fellow-artists came up with!
Symbol of Chaos
A friend of mine has been pressing me for some time now to make a tattoo design for him: a variant of the Symbol of Chaos — specifically, one based on Morbid Angel’s seminal album, Altars of Madness. Last night I was like, ‘Alright, let’s go for it.’
The image below shows a first fleshed-out sketch. I think it looks promising already.
Fun fact (or supposed fact, according to Wikipedia): the Symbol of Chaos has its origins in the fiction of Michael Moorcock. You know, the guy who wrote, among others, the Elric comics? I always imagined it to be derived from the occult, like from, say, I don’t know, Aleister Crowley’s magical diaries… Heh.
A Year in Review
It has been a year since I quit my teacher’s internship. Even more, it has been a year since I left the field of history at large. Now as I look back on last year, I realize I spent far too many years chasing a dream that was never really mine. I’m finally doing what I want, doing what I should have been doing years ago. That’s not to say it has been easy – it hasn’t. And the struggle certainly isn’t over.
Anyway. Here, I will just talk a little about one thing that kept me awake nights: my personal style – or my perceived lack of personal style.
