Today I switched to using fine liner instead of ink. It allows me to work faster and get in more details. So I think I’ll stick to that from now on. Maybe some exceptions ^^
On the topic long I drew a long dragon. Its base shape is more eastern altho they usually have different paws.
I lost a lot of detail to not having enough time and I rushed quite a bit. It makes me think that tomorrow I’ll switch to fine lines. As nice as actual ink looks, I need to also look at what is more doable.
Inktober Day 3: Poison! Today I drew Lunara, a character from my favourite game Heroes of the Storm. She is a dryad who is known for her poisenous spear she uses to protect herself and nature!
Day 2 of Inktober! Today's topic is "Divided"! Despite being divided by space and time, feeling close to each other! This one is dedicated to my boyfriend ❤
It's time for Inktober! Really hope I can do it every day. I'm using the official Inktober 2017 list as it's my first time participating ^_^ Still need to get back into drawing with ink and looking forward to see my progress at the end of the month! Day 1: Swift!
This creature is loosely inspired by the Quetzalcoatl, the giant feathered snake. In my case I kept the concept of the huge snake with wings. I wanted it to look like the giant who seems intimidating at first sight but can be friendly if you get to know it better.
Day 2 of the daily creature challenge and I already push the upload to the last second. But one goal of mine is to improve my ability to organise myself.
Still on the topic of #mermay I drew a jellyfish mermaid. Her bell represents a dress and it is not quite clear what is directly part of her body. I also think she’s up to mischief, seeing how she looks down slightly pretentiously.
I haven’t posted in a while and want to change that. Recently I focused more on drawing creatures again, a passion I neglected the last couple months. I wanted to do a “Daily drawing” or more specifically a “Daily creature” challenge for a while now and seeing a lot of #mermay pictures finally got me to do the first step.
Day 1 is a koi mermaid. I’m not sure what she’s looking at in the distance.
#2 Building the set >>The puppet is one of the most prominent parts of the movie. It is the thing that leads the viewer through the whole film. On one hand it has to look the way we imagined it when writing the script, on the other hand it has to be able to be moved frame by frame.
This means the interior of the puppet has to be built so we can fully animate it. Two solid pieces of wood build the base of the body. The limbs and connection are made out of wire which is twisted to give it more stability but also improve how it can be moved.
The material we used for the surface is a mix of white and orange plasticine, which gives a nice skin tone. Since it never dries, we are always able to move every part of the body. Although this also brings a problem, which is that the figure has the tendency to slightly change its shape over the course of many frames. Therefore, while animating, we have to be very careful not to move it too much at once.
In our story the figure first sits in the bath tub, later on a boat. Since the boat is too small for the original puppet to sit in and a larger one wouldn’t fit into the film set, we have to create a second puppet for these specific scenes. The two puppets are built at the same time to keep them as similar to each other as possible.
The last few weeks I have created a stop motion movie together with @liacart and @samlee-animation. In the following posts I’ll give you a look behind the scenes of this project.
The movie is about a giant man, too big for his own home. He starts dreaming of freedom, being gone from his daily life. But sometimes these dreams can turn into nightmares faster than expected.
What happens when a gigantic wolf and a little girl meet? The almost 8 minute 2D animated movie „Moroshka“ by Polina Minchenok tells the story of what seems to be an impossible friendship. It was produced in 2015 by the famous Moscow studio Sojusmultfilm.
The film takes place in a little village nearby the forest. At the beginning we see a group of girls playing blind man's buff, but they don’t stay alone for long, as a few meters high wolf jumps past them, aiming for the herd of sheep close by. All the girls run away terrified, except Moroshka who is still blindfolded from playing before. She walks right into the wolf’s leg but instead of getting scared, when taking off her blindfold, she is delighted and pets it. The noise of the shepherd’s shotgun scares the wolf and it flees back into the forest.
Sometime later, Moroshka finds the wolf in her barn. Its paw is injured and it is hiding from the villagers hunting it. Moroshka starts caring for it, feeding it regularly and protecting it from the cold until its wound is mended. But eventually the villagers get suspicious of the girl’s behaviour.
The only one who isn’t afraid of the „big bad wolf“ is the little girl Moroshka who petted it before she saw it. Everyone else panics just when looking at the beast, trying to flee or shoot it. But Moroshka got to know it from another side. In the time the wolf spends in Moroshka’s barn, she even manages to make it leave her two sheep in peace and they become close friends.
Stylistically the shapes of the figures and objects are kept simplified but there still is a distinct love for details to be found. They are drawn detailed enough to understand the action without a spoken word and dive into the atmosphere, yet there are no scenes that are overloaded with unnecessities. Even though the pictures are drawn digitally, they rather remind of acrylic painting, which reinforces the fairytale ambience.
Another important element is the music of Zakhar Atonov. Firstly it supports the atmosphere of the images. From the happy montage in which Moroshka takes care of the wolf, to the quiet onset of winter. Secondly hand the music sometimes replaces sound effects. Those are usually skillfully integrated into the soundtrack to not disrupt the flow of the tale.
The film got me to smile, listen up and dream. In addition to the to the animating style, which appeals to me a lot, I especially like how the story works without a single spoken word. The image and sound composition is strong enough to function without narration. Showing the contrast between the small girl and the giant wolf is often achieved by showing Moroshka entirely but only parts of the wolf. The wolf’s size isn’t held consistently throughout the whole movie but since this isn’t important for the course of the story, this is not an issue.
Moroshka is a movie for all ages that leaves a warm, comfortable feeling. However it also brings one to reflect about prejudice, about how fast we assume someone’s personality when looking at their appearance. Because sometimes, behind the scary facade, we find someone who is just misunderstood.
Now it is time to translate the 2D drawing into a 3D model. Through this we will get a fully detailed presentation of the finished character. This can be done in a 3D-modeling program but this post covers how to handcraft a statue.
Materials:
A base (in this case a piece of wood)
Metal wire in different sizes
Tin foil
Styrofoam/styrodur/wood
Monster clay
Glue (preferably two-component glue)
In the first step, the interior of the statue has to be built. The easiest approach is to use a 1:1 drawing of the figure as template and plan all needed parts there. That way the exact measurements can be read off directly from the blue print.
A thick piece of wire serves to anchor the statue into the base. With the Styrofoam, the thicker parts are formed. Styrodur or wood can be used for this as well, the important thing is that the material isn’t too heavy but solid enough. Tin foil is used for the thinner body parts. When gluing together the parts, one needs to be careful that Styrofoam/styrodur can etch when coming in contact with certain glues, which is why two-component glue is advisable.
The last part is modelled with monster clay. First, the whole body gets covered with a thin layer to make sure that the clay sticks. Afterwards the bigger features are worked on first, then the smaller ones. Meaning that the fundamental proportions have to fit before working out the details.
For the eyes, plastic or glass beads can be used. They can also be sculpted with monster clay directly.
A general rule for shapes in sculpting is, that every aspect of the body is either clearly concave or clearly convex. Two of those can merge fluently into each other at the edges but they have a clear beginning and end.
In conclusion, from sketching the first silhouettes over defining details to sculpting, this leads to the finished statue.
<< Last Post: Creating a character #2 - Shapes and Accessories
The next step, after defining the basic silhouette, is to determine all remaining details. The main focus lies first on variation, then on decision-making. This leads to a fully developed front and side view of the finished character.
The main tools to achieve that, are the three main shapes: circle, triangle and rectangle
- Circle: Round shapes make a figure look friendly and warm. They seem nice and trustworthy since they don’t have any sharp edges. Protagonists and children are often based on circles.
- Triangle: Characters, mainly consisting of pointy shapes, are usually the antagonists. The sharp angles make them seem secretive, mysterious and deceitful.
- Rectangle: A rectangular design makes a character look grounded, strong and confident. They either suggest steadiness and dependability or clumsiness and trustworthiness.
These three main shapes can be applied to every single body part and accessory of a character’s design which will help in creating a coherent character, matching to its backstory. The focus should lie on producing as many different options to choose from as possible.
While developing these possiblities, the intention of the character design crystallizes with each new version. It now requires careful decision-making to choose the variation that does it justice the most, and unify them in one single design.
<< Last post: Creating a character #1 – Silhouette
What makes a character recognizable? How does it have to be built to be unique, yet have a distinct message? Why are certain figures better known than others? This is the first entry of a series in which a character is fully developed.
If we take a look at the most popular characters in film and TV, there is one thing they all have in common. Their silhouette is unmistakable. Even when you can just see their shadow, the character is still clearly identifiable. So when creating my own character, the first step is to draw it as a single shape.
The purpose of this is to understand the proportions of the figure’s body parts and weight out which details and accessories are mandatory to do the character’s traits justice. In my example the protagonist is a little cat girl.
Despite appearing quite shy at first glance, her curiosity gets her into trouble regularly. It is important that her childish as well as her cat like characteristics are united.
To emphasize her young age the head is proportionally much larger than it naturally would be, compared to the body. It’s an exaggeration of the baby schema which lets a creature look like a child and thus usually appears cute to us. This effect is also simply called „Cuteness“.
Starting with a silhouette determines the basic appearance of a character. Details may still change over the course of developing its final form.
Next entry: Creating a character #2 - Shapes and Accessories >>
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