[DRAWINGS] Drawings of the quartet

I have neglected to update my sketch book with drawings recently, I feel that I need to begin drawing in it as it is also part of my reflection. I wanted to try drawing all four of my characters again, as I never really draw Max and May too much as I am not animating them currently, however I am still happy with how I draw them very much so. I still feel like I struggle to draw the Young Animator, I need to keep practicing his design and perhaps make slight changes if I need to.

[DRAWINGS] The first Sketchbook

I have completed the first sketchbook which also doubles as my second reflective journal alongside this blog, the sketchbook is currently filled with 53 pages of drawings, sketches and concepts from back when my original idea was about a robot, to when Max was a Monkey all the way up to the designs of the Young animator and the Old animator. I have uploaded a few pages to the blog, however if you want to read the full sketchbook I will post a link below:

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE SKETCHBOOK IN FULL

[DRAWINGS] Recent Sketches: 01/12/2016 - 20/12/2016

I have been focusing more and more of my attention on Max the Cat in my sketchbook, as he is the character which will be solely drawn on paper, I want to draw him in a variety of different poses so I can gauge how he will be expressed in specific positions. I am happy with the drawings I have been producing as I feel they capture the essence of classic animation as well as a hint of modern animation. 

I have nearly finished my sketchbook now so I will continue to sketch in a new sketchbook, I do find Max fun to draw, more so than many other characters I have drawn in the past, I think I will enjoy animating Max using a light-box, as I feel that he will be the most fun character out of all of my cast of characters.

[DRAWINGS] Animaniacs Hand Study

I find hands difficult to draw, however, because the character I have created pays homage to the styles of classic characters, he has gloves on similar to old Warner bros and Disney characters. Having cartoon characters wear gloves goes back to when cartoons were black and white, and animators had to make characters hands show up more easily, plus gloves were fashionable back then. I have previously tried to draw hands as you can see below, however I wanted to try and do a hand-study for characters which I personally really like, the Warner Bros; from Animaniacs.

As previously stated, the Warner Bros pay homage to vintage rubber hose characters with their black and white bodies and gloves, however are thrown into a modern world. Making them the perfect candidates to base Max the Cats hands on. The Animaniacs' hands are interesting, as they are very expressive, as well as fairly elongated when straight. They only have four fingers like other classic cartoon characters of vintage times, and personally I think the hand study went really well, as you can see below:

The more I drew the hands, the more confident I began to be, so after a good few attempts I tried to draw the hands faster, using a stop watch I timed myself and limited myself to 20 seconds per hand. I wanted to see if the quality could stay the same while rushing, as well as try to match the style, below is the result:

Overall I am happy with the outcome and I feel that my hand drawing skills have improved greatly, I will continue to draw hands as it is something that I feel could be improved.

[DRAWINGS] Recent Sketches: 07/11/2016 - 12/11/2016

Now that I have finalized my characters, I have been practicing to draw their faces in different expressions, experimented with styles and overall had fun drawing them. Below is a collection of a variety of drawings I have done over the last week, I spent more time on some than others however I enjoyed drawing each of these:

Max the Cat 

May the Cat

The Old Animator

The Young Animator

Overall I am happy with the drawings I am producing, and I am happy with the character designs I have created. I feel they are diverse from one and other and although the whole idea of my practice is the different mediums, I feel that the styles of each character are very similar, so the art direction doesn't drastically change all the time. This is something I wanted to achieve in my practice as I feel it would be a distraction from the overall story. Below are the main characters in the short which I drew after practicing above:

[DRAWINGS] Old Animator Redesign

I have been doing a few more tests in regards to the older animator, I wanted to create someone who looks slightly more jolly and friendly. I did a few tests again of old peoples faces and found a face I really like, the face had a big bushy bears and a big nose, in contrast to a big bushy mustache and a small nose. I was talking to a couple of Animation and Games students about the design of the previous Old Animator and they said that "they associate mustaches with villains".

I feel like this design is much more friendlier to look at, and I feel he is a good representation of an animator in the early years, I will continue to design the Old Animator and I will more likely try a digital test shortly.

[DRAWINGS] The Female Cat Design Ideas

As stated in the Story Development blog post, I will be creating 4 different characters for this animation; Max the Cat, The Old Animator, The Young Animator and finally, a female, modern cat. For me, this character has a huge role in this animation now, as it is the key contrast to Max the Cat, rather than the Animators. I want it to be a cat, with somewhat similar aesthetics to Max, but completely different. I don't want a realistic looking cat, nor do I want a sort of human/cat hybrid, I want the design to be small, cute and a similar size and shape to Max.

I want this cat to represent digital animation, in contrast to Max representing traditional animation, however I want them to feel like they have some things in common and somethings not in common, for example: I want Max to be able to utalize the principles of animation to impress the female cat, whereas I want the female cat to use motion tweens and effects to impress Max. 

I'm still in the early stages of ideas for this cat, however I feel like the two cat should made a good team, I will develop this cats desgins further and hopefully create something that I will be happy with.

[DRAWINGS] The Young Animator Design Ideas

Although I was considering having a young animator as the main animator rather than an old animator as seen in the Second Character, I have now thought of a new storyline which can incorporate both Young and Old animators as mentioned in the Story Development blog post. I am wanting to create a lanky looking young man, possibly early 20s who seems like a very shaggy character. From the get go, I wanted to young animator to have similar features to perhaps Shaggy from Scooby Doo or Fred from Big Hero Six or perhaps even Lars from Steven Universe. Below are two final design ideas:

I will further develop these characters in the near future, I want him to be relatable to a young audience, perhaps an aspiring animator? I want there to be a distinct contrast between him and the old animator, polar opposites in the way they act, look and animate.

[DRAWINGS] The Old Man Design Idea

I have toyed with the idea of having the old man a lanky guy with glasses for a while, but when I drew the character a bit bulkier, it just sort of fit in my mind. Rather than have an old man who looks like he is old, why not have an old man who is still full of life, continuing to pursue his passion for animation even now.

I wanted to old man to have a mustache and either be bald or wear a hat, however I will probably have the old man enter the room or leave the room with his hat on. For the time being, I am happy with the design of the older looking man, I feel like he is aesthetically appealing and doesn't represent the "grumpy old man" stereotype. I will attempt to draw the man digitally shortly as he will appear in the animation through a digital medium. 

[DRAWINGS] The Cat Design Idea

I have done a little more experimenting with different animals, and I feel like I have come up with a fairly good character idea. I have tried experimenting with cat ears, I thought this would be much easier to manipulate rather than big round monkey ears. I will more than likely change the clothing choice for the cat design, perhaps giving him a shirt rather than bottoms. However for the time being I am fairly happy with the design idea, i'll experiment with a digital version shortly.

[DRAWINGS] Hand Tests and Face Changes

I have been experimenting with a monkey character as one of the main characters in my animation practice, however I have been thinking about other animals which could play the lead role. The face shape would stay the same, however I would give the character a different set of ears, indicating the type of animal the character is trying to portray;

[From the left] Top Row; Cat, Dog, Rabbit, Pig. Middle Row; Cow, Elephant, Hamster. Bottom Row; Human, Mouse, None, Monkey.

As you can see, there are many different types of ears I could give the lead character, however so far I only see a possibility of using 4 ears; the cat ears, the dog ears, the cow ears and the monkey ears. I feel that these sets of animals would appeal to an audience. I will draw a few concept drawings with these animals and see which ones work more.

I wanted to experiment with the body, more so, the clothing. I was inspired to do shorts, gloves and boots as this is the attire of Mickey Mouse, however I have experimented with the possibility of a shirt, gloves and boots, similar to that of the Warner Brothers, below is an example;

You'll notice that there are also a lot of experiments with hands, personally speaking I find hands the most difficult thing to draw, and 1920's animated characters have distinct hand styles because of their gloves and four fingers. I wanted to experiment with a few different hand gestures, so far I am happy with how they turned out, however I will continue practicing drawing hand gestures.

[DRAWING] The Monkey Design Idea

I am wanting to create a character for my practice that could embody a traditional animation style; following the classic principles of animation and perhaps a rubber hose style of animation. I thought it might be a fun idea to try and draw a character which is similar to Micky Mouse, Felix the Cat and Bimbo the Dog. The character I came up with was a monkey with a large grin, large ears and a round belly, I want to stay true to the 1920's era of character designs; jet black eyes, large mouths, white gloves and big shoes.

I am hoping to make the character a bit more "rubber", I want him to have his own physics and his own rules; be able to take his tail off if he so wishes and squash and stretch his body at his own disposal. I'll be experimenting more and more with this character by researching more characters from older cartoon shows, below is the clean version of the monkey character.