Character Design

Lesson 2 in Designing Better Characters

Lesson Information

In this lesson, Wouter will design two different characters. For his main character, he will go through a more traditional process of building, posing and then drawing on top of his model. The line art, color and lighting will all be on distinct layers, so one aspect can be easily altered without changing the other elements. The second character will utilize what Wouter calls the 'Character Creator,' a modular technique which allows mixing and matching of finished costume parts for easy selection later by the artist or clients.

Homework

Meet Your Character

First, build and pose your 3D model. There are endless possibilities in 3D, but that can hurt as much as help. Don't get lost in this phase by endlessly tweaking things. Afterwards, create a rough sketch over the 3D render in Photoshop. The 2D Photoshop phase is where you want to spend the bulk of your time. This sketch will help guide the look of your character going forward.

It's Alive!

Finish your character design. Try to keep your line art, flat colors and lighting on their own separate layers for more versatility. Upload your completed homework to the Learn Squared site.

Extra Credit

Build a Character Creator with multiple interchangeable costume parts. You can either do this with a new character, or the one you already designed.

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Al Limbu 2 years ago

For anyone having issues with Daz to Blender Character Transfer, try and watch "Daz Bridges Tutorial - Daz to Blender" on YouTube. The instruction on the first chapter didn't work for me probably because of new updates.