Let’s Talk About the Design of PPG's Humans
AKA the Citizens of Townsville.
Continuing the series of talking about PPG 1998 design elements from when I talked about the backgrounds and world design of PPG, Let’s take a greater focus on human characters.
A reminder, The powerpuff girls and many cartoons from their era were inspired by the UPA style of animation from the 1950s. I recently discovered a good write up about how this style influenced shows like the Powerpuff Girls from an animation Blog that you can take a gander at here.
That being said, when it comes to the humans of the PPG world they continue to use a strong, sharp geometric style that stands out. It’s been stated before that the humans were intentionally designed this way along with the rest of the PPG world to make the Powerpuff Girls stick out even more with how round they are.
Fortunately I managed to gather a bunch of episode sheets for background characters from Season 1 of Powerpuff Girls. So let’s study them so we can better understand their design.
Now, when I say the characters are “Geometric,” I mean that they are largely defined by simple shapes. Circles, Squares, and Triangles.
If we look at these three incidentals. We can see that they defined by large shapes, accented with smaller shapes within to make their design. Their eyes are often circles. Their heads could be circles, squares or even sharp triangles. Each of these gives these incidental characters a sense of personality even if we only see them on screen for one scene.
Notice how even their poses can be defined by simple shapes. They re snappy with details that are easy to notice even from a distance away.
We can even see this with the secondary and main humans.
The Professor is made up of mostly squares and rectangles. As he is often the rock, the foundation and source of stability for the girls.
Ms. Keane is rounder, predominated by ovals. Her body is one solid oval, and her overall look makes her appear very friendly, the kind of person you’d want to see being a teacher to young children.
The Mayor is round as well, but his ovals make him look more portly. Someone you could see being a jolly and equally bumbling fellow.
Ms. Bellum is both sharp and round. From her legs to her arms and her hips. The balance between the two shapes make her a more dynamic character. One who is friendly to the girls, dry to the mayor, and has even stood her own in a few fights.
These are all important ideas to keep in mind, as the Powerpuff Girls world isn’t normally full of PPGs like the girls. It’s full of these geometric, yet diverse humans!
I’ve kept this in mind when designing Tara, Chris, Kevin, and Nancy. Some of my Human PPG OCs. Trying to give them a distinct look, one that can tell you about their personalities at a glance.
Tara is tall and round, friendly but tends to worry and fret as most of the sharper parts of her design are around her head. Chris is short, round, but largely in a squarish shape to show they are the more grounded of the two. Kevin is largely rectangular with some odd round shapes to show he’s strong but kind. Nancy is mostly round, with some rectangular and pointed shapes to show she’s equal parts friendly and dynamic. Perhaps Sassy?
In conclusion. Main, Secondary, Incidental, or otherwise, the way a character is built is an important aspect to their design.
We as humans tend to associate certain shapes with certain things, and the artists and designers took advantage of that when emulating the UPA style. Giving Townsville a very visually diverse, yet easy to visually read an identify population
A useful thing to keep in mind whether you’re a fan who creates content or a casual appreciator of cartoons, and I encourage those who have taken the time to read this to be observant in what goes into a character’s design. What shapes can you identify? What is it about a character’s shape or look that makes them visually distinct? As while even an incidental character could only appear once and never again, it’s important to consider how they might look in a scene, in crowd, and how that look serves the media they come from.
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