After making a lot of changes to the characters back story, getting new feedback and improving the new item ideas for the character I have decided to go over what I have created to improve my design to better match the information. As I have created my character digitally on photoshop and worked on a lot of different layers. it has saved me time to go over what I created and work from what I already have.
From the feedback I was given one thing that was noticed was the joint work of the characters legs not being represented well on the design, from this I have gone back to looking at even more references to see how I could improve the design.
By resketching over what I have created already I had lined over all the main features of the body so that I can edit the joints without affecting the original design. From this I edited the tail as it was way too long for what it should have been and I have made sure to line it with the spine and as for the legs I have repositioned the leg to make it hang more natural to the characters posture.
To make things look more natural and give texture I will also be using a lot of crosshatching drawing techniques for things like the legs to fit with the flow, I have also made sure to go in the direction in which the body part is facing adding a sense of gravity.
I have gone over the characters bodywork for the image so that it looks a lot more natural and the sizes have all been edited as the legs looked long and the shoulders were too broad for the body type, I’m looking for. As a note I will not be focusing on the underbody too much so a lot of the detail can be relaxed on the chest as the end products design focuses on his outer clothes and its mainly for reference however, I can be something to work on in the future if it is ever needed.
Here I have gone over the basic colours and adjusted their tone so that it blends in better with what I want.
As this is the final design, I will be working very closely to detail to make sure that the image is of the highest quality possible.
Am also going over the shading to make sure that places that reflect light, do so properly and blend in smoothly.
As Jayson will be walking around with no coverings on his feet his hooves will get dirty from the muddy floors and public streets, I reflected this by using a brush that resembles mud to add texture.
Like before I will be checking my work over a dark blue background to make sure that no loose colours affect the drawing.
For one comment that was made was the legs heir not looking right and seeming a bit flat, this was the one part I hesitated to create because to get the look people are talking about I would have to sit and do each strand one by one, which I did. This took up most of the time trying to finish this character but I was aiming for high quality as the final image could potentially be sold along with its character sheet content.
Fixing Jayson’s face I re worked the mouth and touched up the blending of the skin so that it would match. As I am also aiming big with this one I want to be able to have the ability to change the features whenever I see fit so I added the other ear and gave him his full head so that if I wanted to change the style or face pose I could quite easily with this saving me time in the future.
The body has a nice new fit with a body shape that has been re worked to better suit him. As im not planning on showing of his chest in the main images I only shaded up to his shoulders but I have marked the appropriate areas to use as a reference for further drawings.
I didn’t agree with how the horns sat on his head so I tried over and over again looking at different ways to draw them till felt they fitted perfectly and this was the style I ended up with which I think look a lot better.
From the responses I was thinking about leaving the hair as it but with the new horns and ears the most of it was hidden by the design so I had combined a few will I reached the one I have now
Using the past designed hair as a reference I recreated the same affect by retaking the steps I took last time by using a mix of blending and shading to match it perfectly.
Using the new reference materials that I have gathered making the props for Jayson I have been working on sketching over his new body to create clothing that suits his class better as an assassin Warlock. They can only wear leather and light armour as its effective for sneaking so that will be my goat to create.
When making the new gear I will be thinking about setting and traits, as he has a decent sum of money he will most likely go for used items of if he brought them new hew would never replace them unless its severally broken, to show this off I created a range of scuffs and marks throughout the design to show wear and tear.
For the last stages of design I recreated the clove to better fit a magical item and I have re done the coat pattern so that it is no longer and image taken from the internet and it is now a pattern I can re-use ever and over, (See FMP Fantasy Character Part 4: Item Development)
This is now the new look of my fantasy character Jayson with a side by side look comparing the last design.