The "it opened my eyes" workshop/talk with Even Mehl Amundsen
In case you don't know who I'm talking about.....
"He is a Norwegian illustrator and concept artist widely recognized for his fantasy based character designs and monsters. He has traveled and worked all over the world from Norway to Canada and then Prague, Czech Republic, which has helped him develop a very particular and yet popular style. His talks and demos are very lively and spectacular, but also extremely insightful."
- We Are Playgrounds (interested in more? check the link)
Now.... you may ask yourselves "why did I choose an illustrator/concept artist?"
Simple : I want to continue focusing on character design and illustration
Now back to the artist I was talking about.....
I think the first time I fell in love with his artworks was on instagram (or maybe the old artstation?) when I saw a sketch. For me that simple drawing looked so fluid and alive that hooked me as a fan. Imagine the excitement when I heard he was a veteran in the We are Playgrounds Art Depatament.
Notes from the character design workshop
—Make your character believable rather than realistic - make the others believe that your characters are part of a reality
Start with the general idea
after creating the world start putting down the rules
The more rules/restrictions you have the easier is to create your character
The questions to ask yourself create the rules of the action-narrative:
What does this culture have it available, either by production, trade or acquisition? ( basically in the world you created, think about the culture you are creating, how the people are living/surviving/believe in and so on)
What do they empathise as culture?
What is the level of tech and how widespread the availability?
What is their aesthetics based on?
You need to be aware of your audience beliefs - convince the that your character is real
How the characters personality -soul-is crashing with their destiny
Reduce the character to a motif
Study your character: deconstruct -> analyse-> reconstruct-> apply
Gestures and expressions: focus especially on eyes and hands
After finishing your sketch pin-point every cultural reference of the characters world and rules
Colour sets : create a harmony based on the worlds reference
Using shades can create inner volume
Play with the lighting to get : drama/textures/energy
I took notes on his talk and started to apply them in my work, and slowly I started to have more control over my creative flow.
Personally I never paid detailed attention to the context of my illustration or concept art as I believed my audience won't really look into it. Now I understand that I never really knew where to start and how refined my research should be when creating the character/illustration/ concept for the upcoming projects
As a student at the start of my creative journey what I learned from the his talks helped me jump over future problems in creating projects and pitches and organizing my workflow.
