I just tried a few different approaches to my monster friend from the wallpaper (see previous post). I not only was trying different views and expressions, I was slightly modifying the design each time. I never got he jowls quite the way I wanted. Anyway, here's what I played at today...
On this one, I tried to color them in with gray PITT brush pens. I normally love them, but hate them for this purpose. Very uneven application. Maybe I could eventually get the hang of them, but instead I will wait for my set of gray Prismacolor markers to arrive. And for the other two, I colored them in in Photoshop.
He can't be angry all the time...
I went for a little more detail here and got carried away. Oh... and the girl was something I had already doodled on the same piece of paper from a couple of weeks ago. I colored them both in Photoshop.
This one I liked more. He is less rat-like, with his head taking up half his body size. I'm still not sure of his scale, though. He might be three or four feet tall. Maybe seven.
Seeing how posture affects his underbite.
This was my first attempt at an action pose. I thought I could do better...
...So I cleaned it up a little. Fixed the anatomy, but lost a lot of the energy.
This is another attempt at Photoshop color.
Doing all of these sketches makes one really start to think about character. What is this thing like? What is his personality? At first glance, one might assume he is a villain. I know I did. But remember... villains never think of themselves as villains. From their own perspective, they have noble desires.
Consider Scar from "The Lion King". He thought he could do a better job running the Pridelands than his brother. He didn't set out to make a wasteland, he was trying to build an empire. It was his character flaw - his selfishness - that drove him to murder his brother and make a travesty of the throne. He didn't think of himself as evil, just smarter.
Javier in Les Miserables didn't consider himself a villain. He was searching for justice. It was the hero of the story, Jean Valjean, who thought of himself as a villain, for he knew he was a convict on the run.
That's what makes romantic comedies so enjoyable... (ahem)... I mean... for chicks, yeah... uh... anyway, as I was saying, In a romantic comedy, the two lovebirds hate each other for most of the film (or at least one hates the other). Each considers the other the enemy, but neither is.
Stalin, Lenin, Hitler, Edi Amin, Kim Jong-il... each of these guys would consider themselves the savior of their country, not murderous meglomaniacs. Even Bruce the shark in Jaws wasn't out to destroy a vacation town. He was just looking for his next meal.
So when you are creating an antagonist, whether a drawing or writing a story, make sure that in his or her own mind, they have a noble goal.
My monster friend here? I'm not sure what his deal is yet. I think he's just hungry.
2 comments:
Haha, I love these drawings! You are definitely having too much fun.
I like what you said about characterization. Each character needs to have a drive, whether a good one or evil one.
Exactly. But my point is that from the villain's point of view, his drive isn't evil. (Except for the twirly mustached villains from silent films, tying helpless maidens to the railroad tracks).
An antagonist is usually self serving, if anything. They might know that they operate outside the law, but in that case, they will think of themselves as above the law. Like Don Corleone the villain/hero, or the crooked cops in L.A. Confidential, John Wilkes Booth, etc.
Consider these other examples:
Long John Silver, Blofeld (from the Bond films), the Terminator, HAL from 2001, everyone except for Tom Cruise in The Firm.
Of course, in crime stories, it's often a regular person trying to cover up what they did wrong, like in every episode of Law & Order.
Or what about when the roles are reversed, like in the Jesse James movies, his friend Robert Ford is considered the bad guy, when Jesse is the bank robber. Or Bonnie & Clyde; bad guys are the protagonists.
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