@1nkL1z4rd Note: Sorry for all the M dashes; I'm just the M dash monarchy & I refuse 2 let AI claim them. Note note: sorry if I flip-flop a lot; this is completely unedited & raw stream of consciousness writing. I struggle with keeping my thoughts in one place. ACTUAL DESIGN-DESIGN RULES. I'm talking aesthetics/character appearance. Preferably, this is completed after you get the general idea of who / what / where the character in the story is. (Doesn't have to be super detailed) This in particular applies mostly to more cartoonish - or less realistic- characters. (Though this also applies somewhat to the average every-day Joe Shmoe type character, which I'll touch on l8r). Say, for example, you have an undead spooky sort of monster OC. Maybe it's a jolly, approachable fella. That could be conveyed best with a brighter color palette, maybe with some pretty yellows or vibrant oranges, in addition to a couple darker or cooler-toned colors to represent the fact that it's dead. Maybe some rotten browns or wilted-looking greens. Maybe the design riffs a little off how it died. If it got hit by a car, you could represent that by giving it a tattoo or something that looks like a tire track. Nothing too on the nose. Another component in character designs is shape language- how shapes & silhouettes affect the perception of the character. An example of this in popular media would be Kingpin in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. His silhouette contains mostly squares, which makes him look rather imposing & immovable. This ties nicely to his actual character. He is LITERALLY very bulky and immovable; more figuratively, though, it could represent how he is very hard-headed & unwilling to MOVE ON from the loss of his family & how nothing will dissuade him from his ultimate goal of bringing them back. You can also see some good examples of this in the Hollow Knight franchise. Hornet's design is made up of a lot of triangles. This helps give the figure a sleek & aerodynamic look, which suits her mechanics in-game. But anyways. Bringing back our dead guy example. First, we should consider its goal in our narrative. Maybe it wants to bring itself back from the dead? Perhaps then we should use more thin triangular shapes to represent how feeble its current form is? If we were basing the design on purely personality, maybe some round, approachable-type shapes to denote its affability? These are just some ideas. KEEP IN MIND SHAPE LANGUAGE IS ABSOLUTELY NOT NOT NOT required for good designs; in fact, I tend to skip this facet of character design cos I mostly design for myself- & it's a hassle. (Lotta different shapes with a lotta different meanings!) But if you're looking for more professional designs, it's defo something to consider. So right now, with the knowledge we've assembled thus far, I'm imagining our little guy as maybe a roundish, friendly-looking fella with a bright palette, maybe bright-looking clothes and muted icky green (hi!) or brown skin. Or maybe bright skin & clothes with some darker patches to tie home the idea that it's not completely happy with itself or being dead. What if instead though… he was MEAN & EVIL. Maybe some more triangular shapes with a darkish palette consisting of mostly intense reds or bruised-looking purples. Maybe have its expression read as more smug. Ok, this part was meant to be a sort of wrap-up of this section, but I remembered I forgot to mention something important. This is gonna go on for a while; I'm writing this as it comes to me, so I'll try to be as concise as possible. Set rules of patterns. This is the main rule I abide by when designing coats/skin patterns. Example: “In my current design, the lighter colors encapsulate the highlight color I'm using; the highlight color will ALMOST ALWAYS be contained within the lightest colors; very rarely will it contact the darker areas & when it does, it will only be for contrast.” Simpler example: to keep the cohesiveness of this design, the circle patterns mostly won't touch the squares; they will only touch the squares on the ear tips and the tail tip because I am trying to highlight those areas in specific. Also something like: I only put star patterns in brown areas. THIS IS AN EXAMPLE, mix this up in your own designs! Also important to note that the rules you set for yourself should be unique to that specific character, to avoid repetitive designs. It's 3:21 AM on a school night as of writing this; I gotta go to bed. I'll add WAY MORE to this project tomorrow. So check back up maybe Friday or whenever you want, since I'm pretty sure you're in a different time zone. Response will be going over the second part of your question. I am not done with this one tho. I have a LOT more to talk about, but I have no more time, so I'll leave it here for now.
