When I'm designing a character, I need a tool that allows for two things: speed
and flexibility. That's why I use this super high tech, top-of-the-line...
...whiteboard. Come in here I'll show you how this works
I'll just clear the canvas ... and I can begin drawing. It's just like a Cintiq! So
when coming up with a character I like to start with a very rough gesture
drawing. I'm also searching for the proportions of this baby dragon I have
in mind. Now of course you could do this in any medium. The reason I like the
whiteboard though, is it's just fast. The immediate feedback you get with that one
marker on a slick surface just makes for the fewest possible interruptions
between me and my ideas. I drew a little cylinder there to remind me that this
character is round. And now I'm working out that roundness on the body. I've got
the whiteboard eraser in my other hand which is equally as responsive and as
critical to the process as the marker ... as you can see! So, I used to have my
whiteboard hanging on my wall but now I keep it on an easel right next to my
desk and I use it as a fertile ground for exploration. And exploration involves
you know, gesturing, trying out shapes, making mistakes,
erasing stuff, putting it back, erasing it again. That's where I want to be when I'm
following my own creative impulse. And because the whiteboard is kind of a
crude drawing tool I think it only helps foster the mindset of destructive
creativity, if we can put it that way! That is, I'm not too precious about my
whiteboard drawings which ironically means I'm usually a little more
free-flowing with my ideas on here. I'm working over the form very lightly just
reinforcing my understanding of that roundness. All right so now we're gonna
work out some lighting. h--wait what the heck is this?? This video is sponsored
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whether it's for your art, your business, or both - I'm sure you'll be able
to create something great with Wix. ...My whiteboard does that. Anyway let's move
our design forward with a quick lighting pass. Now, applying light and shadow
really depends on knowing the planes of something. So what I'm doing here is I'm
showing you how I'm visualizing this form. The head in particular. I want to
break the design down into box-like geometry. In other words: simple forms
that allow me to better see in three dimensions. Just gonna add a little bit
more complexity to the upper head here with a few more planes, finish off the
bottom jaw area, and good. Now I can pick a light direction. Let's try a top-down
light. What I'm thinking about now is the direction that each plane of the Box
faces. I'm doing that visually here by having these lines that run along the
form. These two planes turn away from the light so they'll be in shadow. The entire
form of the head will cast a shadow onto the neck. And I think these two planes
are turned away enough to receive shadow as well. I'll clarify some of the
geometry here and just finish up my shadow pass ... all right so this is what
I'll be visualizing as I now move on to the next step. So, I'll call up my menu
here and say 'New Layer,' and on that layer I'll use ... more markers of course! That's a
layer of parchments tracing paper by the way. It's also a slick surface which will
make for some interesting marker use later - you'll see. What I'm doing here
right now though is not light and shadow yet - it's local value. So like, the chest
area might be a bit of a lighter skin tone and this part might be a bit of a
darker skin tone. and I'm purposely using these scribbly strokes to indicate a bit
of texture. Maybe even revealing some incidental highlights in the areas that
I leave blank. Now I'll use that marker to actually add some shadow to the
lighter areas, like here in the head that was blocked in light so this value will
look like shadow under the jaw there. Alright so I'll get out a black marker
and I'm not only putting in the darkest darks with this marker but I'm also
refining some of the contour. I suppose you could go for a really tight line
drawing at this point. I'm not doing that though. I'd like to clean up my
whiteboard drawing a little bit, but with the overall intention of staying loose.
after all this is an early concept stage. okay now check this out!
That black marker is still wet on the tracing paper, so I'm using this blending
marker to bleed it out almost like watercolor or an ink and wash drawing.
This is where I'll start delineating those planes I showed you earlier: like
those under-planes of the head here. I'll reinforce some of the jaw area and also
get at the teeth, bleeding a little bit of that black marker for a slight shadow.
Continuing on with my line drawing, also putting down more material for future
use with my blending marker. And there is some animal leg anatomy here that's not
quite sound. I'm noticing it but I think fixing it at this point would derail my
creative process. I'll fix it later. And while that black marker is still wet
I'll get out my blending marker and start working some subtle shadow values
on the planes that I think point under. That is, turning away from the top light.
And we're already almost done with this sketch. You're seeing it a little sped up,
in real time this might have taken me 15 minutes. I think this process is great
for warm-up sketches or sketch breaks ... things like that. Here I'm using a white
marker to put in some highlights. It lays nicely over the grayer tones. A few
refinements here and let's call that finished. Remove the whiteboard magnets
and we have ourselves a nice little character concept sketch. And, call me a
romantic, but there's just something nice about having an original sketch in your
hands! And I don't have to stop there. Of course I could have another go with the
markers, and another. That's the nice part about the tracing paper. Alright it's
time to take this digital. I'm gonna transfer this drawing to my computer now
with this new phaser beam uplink! This is very experimental technology! Whoa!
And with only a minor concussion, I now have my drawing in Photoshop! I went ahead and
created this flat version of it on a transparent background. This will provide
me a base to now refine the design even further. I'll make a new layer, call it
line, and I'll use my whiteboard drawing a little transparently underneath just
for reference, and I'll refine the line drawing once more. This time I'll
actually fix that troublesome part of the leg by imagining the skeleton
underneath. At this point I'm dispensing with a lot of the sketchiness and trying
to arrive at a kind of honest contour. This is still not the cleanest drawing
in the world but it's a step cleaner from what it was. Now, I love sketchy
lines, but in order to assess whether a design is working or not, a cleaner
version does help. Here I'm just adjusting the opening of the jaw. I just
felt like this little guy could be trying a little bit harder to do
whatever he's doing ... roaring or spitting fire or something.
I'm also modifying the proportions a little bit. Alright check this out: I
mocked up a little 3d model. Super crude, but I'll put it there, lock the layer and
just use it as lighting reference. I'm going for this soft overhead diffuse
light which i think is a lighting condition that can be painted pretty
quickly: just a few soft brushes to start indicating some shadows again looking at
the areas where the form is turning under and already with those cleaner
lines and this soft shading our painting starts to take on a dimensional effect.
And I'm really benefiting from all the exploration I did on the whiteboard and
with the markers I find it much more difficult to design something when
you're working out both the lighting and the character at the same time. It can be
done but it's harder. OK so this is the angled strokes filter in Photoshop. I
like to use it to help keep me loose sometimes. And this is now a new layer.
I'll call it lights I'll set the layer to 'color dodge' and I'll start putting in
some lights. Now there already were lights in there... that is, the base tone I
started with was a stand-in for light once I put the shadows there. So where
I'm putting these lighter lights is basically the exact opposite of where I
put the shadows: the shadows went on the planes that turned under ... these lighter
lights go on the planes that turn up. The planes that point up are going to
receive the most light rays from that diffuse light. Simple as that.
I'm now addressing what's going on with those teeth. They were kind of jumbled
looking. And I feel like the local value on the head should be a bit darker and
let's throw some nostrils on the guy. nostrils just seemed like an integral
part of a dragon. The other integral part of a dragon I'm missing is the tail.
whoops. I guess I'll add one a little baby tail, befitting the age of this
dragon. And while I'm thinking about how to reveal this character's age, let's add
a 'color dodge' layer, onto which I'll use a textured brush which looks like fire.
That is, a sorry excuse for fire. Poor guy ... he's still learning! Ah, don't forget to
flip your canvas! Something magic happens when you do that - it's like you're seeing
your design for the very first time. it's the closest you'll ever get to
having an objective look at what you're doing.
Just adding some soft ambience into the scene, adjusting the edge on that cast
shadow, and just making small tweaks to the environment in the background to get
it reading nicely against the character. Okay here's a cool little stylistic tip:
duplicate the layer, go to filter -> stylize -> find edges, set that layer to multiply,
give it a layer mask, invert the layer mask, and now paint white into the layer
mask to reveal that effect. It gives you these subtle outlines on your shapes
that I think are nice when used with discretion. I flattened down that layer
and I'm just making tiny little adjustments here but as far as a design
sketch goes I think I can call this complete. Stay tuned for more videos
about characters; there's so much to talk about. All right! Some cool news: I just
launched a Discord server! It's real lonely in there right now so come join!
check the pinned comment for an invite. lastly thank you to my Patrons who
really help make these videos possible. And that's all for me folks. Happy
character sketching, and I'll see you in another video!