Backstage Pass #21 (Patreon)

On this week’s edition of Backstage Pass, I’ll be talking about…

An overview of how I design characters! More specifically, how I design characters generally rather than just for a comic format, because there are some slight differences with my approach that I’ll talk about in another Backstage Pass.

When designing characters, I like to keep three main traits in mind; visual noise, species recognition, and individuality. Let’s break these down!

Visual noise refers to how busy a character’s design looks. Busyness does not automatically equal a bad design though, it just means that the audience will need to look at it longer to parse out specific details! In illustration, this can make a piece look intricate and beautiful, standing out because the audience will spend longer absorbing and appreciating the effort going into the design. It also means that a character will require more effort to put together without getting muddled, which can get difficult with sequential art like comics. Things like fur patterns, accessories, etc. would fall under this category.

Species recognition, while a term I usually only use in the context of fanwork, can also apply to a variety of other creatures, like making sure cat and dog characters look distinct from one another. Part of the charm with creating characters is capturing the essence of a certain species' appeal in illustrated form. While unique designs are appealing, it's good to also bear in mind whether or not the species will be recognizable at a passing glance. This helps an audience identify with the character much more quickly. Though, this is admittedly something I still struggle with from time to time in my own art and have been working to improve on.

Individuality is what separates a character from all other designs of similar species. While it’s easy to cheat through this by giving a character a tuft of hair or an accessory, there are many other ways to give characters distinct features! Some of my favorites are changing their overall “texture” (such as Rune’s points vs Dielle’s rounder features), eye shape, girth, height, etc. Other fun ways can include fur/skin patterns, palette variation, and scars!

And that's a quick overview on design! These are by no means the only ways to approach character design, but they certainly are how I like to go about it.