Some stuff from the past few weeks of character design! The most important lesson we are learning is you have to break everything down into SIMPLE SHAPES FIRST BEFORE ADDING ANY DETAIL. None of the drawings above are detailed at all - everything is suuuuuuuuuper basic. Obviously I’ve been drawing for a long time, but I found these lessons very helpful. 

For the head breakdowns, we were encouraged to trace the basic structure directly from the photos - as you can see from the lines on the paper (the animation paper I used is super thin so yeah they pressed through) I did that. I don’t have a huge problem if it’s traced from real people (but it still felt weird). The top three were entirely traced for placement, and the bottom three were only traced so far as the circles and and eye/nose lines. Also without eyelids or eyebrows they look so freaky! 

I have other tutorials here: http://incaseyouart.tumblr.com/tagged/tutorial

Specifically, more from me on feet: http://incaseyouart.tumblr.com/tagged/feet

More from me advice/tips on hands: http://incaseyouart.tumblr.com/tagged/hands

More from me on mouths: http://incaseyouart.tumblr.com/tagged/mouths

More from me on head breakdowns: http://incaseyouart.tumblr.com/tagged/head

Also the blog of @grizandnorm is fantastic and there are tons of tutorials that I would really recommend checking out! Our teachers show us them all the time~