Digital Illustration & Character Design

Students will be challenged to create a character sheet. They will develop the character subject: animal, plant, person, hybrid, etc. They will decide on realism or fantasy. Students will also design personalities, accessories, costumes, and color theory consideration.
They will have the opportunity to draw these traditionally first to sketch out various character ideas. Once they've sketched a minimum of 5 different possible characters, they will meet in small groups to determine which of the designs is their best designs. They will have written small back stories and personality profiles.
Their choice of character will be based on how well they considered the elements of design, color theory, and overall creativity and originality of the character itself.
Once they've determined their character of choice, they will meet with the teacher one-on-one to discuss and present their concept. Once approved, they can begin drawing with their wacom tablets! Programs available may include Krita or other chrome compatible drawing programs.
The character sheets will include a front view, side view, back view, and three quarter view. They will also create expression sheets separately, to see how their character's face would look - angry, sad, happy, perplexed, irritated, curious, etc.
Both sheets will include a minimum of 4 layers - background, line art, color, and shading/highlights.
They will be graded on craftsmanship, consideration, and creativity!
Students will have an opportunity to meet with peers and the teacher once they're partially through the process to determine if any changes need to be made when moving forward.
Once approved again, they will move forward to a finished product!
They will present both sheets to the class and describe their character in full detail.
This is a pre-lesson for future potential animations in a program such as fire alpaca.
Character design and storyboarding will be taught prior to animation process.