Character Colouring

Because my character is a mix of three animals I wanted to have a mix of all their patterns on him while keeping to the brown and white colour scheme. This is rough mock up as the colours and textures will be discussed together in class.

Story and Storyboard development:

The Story:

Hero’s Journey

1.Heroes are introduced in the ORDINARY WORLD

they receive the CALL TO ADVENTURE

Christine (AKA cat lady) Casey  Upchurch

2. They are RELUCTANT at first or REFUSE THE CALL, but

are encouraged by a MENTOR to

Brad Mancer, Caitlin Bauer

3.CROSS THE THRESHOLD and enter the Special World, where

they encounter TESTS, ALLIES, AND ENEMIES.

Gin sparrow, Scott Eng

4. They APPROACH THE IN-MOST CAVE, cross a second threshold

where they endure the ORDEAL

Minjoo Bai,  Emma Dowman

5. They take possession of their REWARD and

are pursued on THE ROAD BACK to the Ordinary World.

Katina Munro

6. They cross the third threshold, experience a RESURRECTION, and are transformed by the experience.They RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR, a yam or treasure to benefit the ORDINARY WORLD.

Su Jeong Kwon

My Story Idea:

Close up of Okapi’s face (side view, can’t see horn). He arches his eyebrow vainly. Zooms out to full body shot of Okapi in a very proud stance. Turns his head to the camera grinning. He is super proud of his horn. There’s a pause in his stance for effect. His head falls to the ground because the horn is too heavy. He awkwardly tries to lift his head up but can’t. His head doesn’t move and his body is struggling. His body moves around his head. He has crazy leg movement. He tries to remain cool and as if this whole situation is fine by the look on his face.
Next shot: No animal in view. The then Okapi slowly moves his body across the screen (left to right) with his head being dragged along behind him. Pauses for breath etc. Exits right.

 I developed my own story and redrew my storyboard. I wanted to create more depth and interest in the story. I did this by having the Okapi's head drop into a puddle and have him struggling to breathe -as a bit of dark humour. I wanted to add to the quirkiness by adding in a snail that has little interaction with the Okapi character. 
I will see in class what story is better and if it needs further development. 

Character Modeling

Starting in Zbrush
I wanted to get my basic shape created in Zbrush to save myself time then export it to Maya to fix up the typology then finally export back to Zbrush again to create more details. Export to a map and have high res on a low res model in Maya.

Getting the basic shape using Zspheres. Created an adaptive skin then exported to Maya.

Exported to Maya. I need to fix up the typology, but its actually pretty decent at the moment.

Character Design Cont. 2

Development and Final

I wanted my creature to be a mix of the chosen animals (horse, zebra, giraffe, okapi). 

The first design was too elegant for my liking. I wanted to create a creature that you could understand why it wanted to look beautiful and stand out from its herd. 

Okapi: Ears, back legs and pattern on the tail
Horse: Body and front legs, horse influenced face, mane, neck
Giraffe: Pattern on neck and shoulders
Zebra: Zebra like mane on tail

FINAL:

I tried to get more features in there and give it more character without looking elegant and attractive.

Okapi: Back legs, pattern on tail
Horse: Body, hair on back leading down to the tail
Giraffe: Ears, ossicones (horns), pattern on face, neck, shoulders and back

Quadruped Character Influence

Character Design Cont.

Silhouettes:

Okapi character silhouettes

Giraffe character silhouettes -ignore how one is missing its head...

Silhouettes inspired by my favourite artist Salvador Dali

Getting into the more different creatures. Left based on a greyhound.

Artists

One of my favourite artists is Salvador Dali. I really like his long legged creatures. I'll incorporate this into my silhouettes.