Assignment: Ideation
Assignment: Ideation
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Character Design Monster Lab

Ideation

Assignment: Ideation

1.1K

Assignment: Ideation

1.1K

Assignment

Fill up a sheet or digital canvas with brainstormed ideas. Be sure to leave notes in there to make your thought process clear. You don’t have to go as crazy as I do with this stuff, but I’m encouraging you to give it a try and see what happens. I think you’re going to be pleasantly surprised at your results. I'll be looking at the comments to see what you post, and some of these will make it into a video critique.

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tgsgames
Hello! Happy to be doing this course. I took my sweet time with this one. I was surprised at how difficult I found coming up with my seed was. You can probably see where I started to really engage with the process. In either case, these are my Yard (as in Scrapyard) Golems! All powered by human hearts! I'm going to spend some more time on ideation sheets before I move on to the next phase of the course. My idea (based off of the critique videos) is to pull a few of these I like and push them further with their own sheets. I will say once this process started to click - and once I was willing to make it my own - I think it really started to work for me. Plus I started bringing draw small for big ideas and filling in profiles into my sketchbook as well!
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Baptiste Desvaux
Thanks for the course, this is very helpfull ! I tried the first exercice but there was too much different ideas and I've lost focus... The final idea is GMO plants became parasites that infect the fauna to take revanche on the humans.
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Cody Brisco
Just got your course a few days ago, really enjoying it. Love seeing your Kaijune work on Instagram. Here are my takes on Harvestmen.
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Flavio
Here is my ideation sheet. I know I spent too much time in details rather than keeping things simpler but I tend to fall in love with my creatures. Thus I would always like to refine and also paint them. The real problem is that I don't succeed to draw a really scary worm... they always turn out to be pretty dumb! I'd love some feedback @Scott Flanders
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Flavio
Here is my ideation sheet. I know I spent too much time in details rather than keeping things simpler but I tend to fall in love with my creatures. Thus I would always like to refine and also paint them. The real problem is that I don't succeed to draw a really scary worm... they always turn out to be pretty dumb! I'd love some feedback @Scott Flanders
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James Connolly
Part 2, couldn’t fit the entire page and was having too much fun
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James Connolly
just signed up, but enjoying it so far @Scott Flanders
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Andrew Schlageter
so @Scott Flanders, has me anxiously excited for this course and to explore character design. Here's my first assignment. I picked a "multi-organism monster" prompt that would allow me to explore concepts and silhouettes a bit outside of my comfort zone, while being within my own cryptic taste. I wanted to explore certain themes that would have me thinking of different dynamics where multiple creatures come together to function as one. I had fun with this, but fear I may have taken this in a non-beneficial direction. First off, I'm concerned that the precedents that first came to mind were a bit too obscure, either in their entirety or in the way I executed them visually, rather than creating unique versions of architypes. My second concern is that the diversity of ideas is too broad and that the prompt "multiple organism" isn't strong enough visually to make them seem unified under the same concept. Other than that, I'm also not completely satisfied with my layout, as I see it is filled with potential tangents and clumps at a point to the left. I was hoping to organize the visual notations in a way that would take the viewer in a transition across the page but I did not plan that too well and was a bit lost in generating relating ideas. I know I'm not supposed to use too much judgement but hey, I'm all for improvement at this point in my life. A bit of background, I graduated from a tech school in Illustration back in 2019. Long term, I aspire to be a character designer. And even if I don't wind up in entertainment art, I still want to learn and strengthen my fundamentals as I love drawing narrative scenes with expressive, convincing characters and environments. I am also taking Fundamentals of Character Design and Figure Drawing Fundamentals.
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Mustafa K
Hey! @Scott Flanders Thoroughly enjoying the lectures as well as the assignments and the process Here I've explored a sea monster theme inspired by Magic the gathering artworks Would love some feedback on the designs and advice on what to do next Thanks :)
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Ireneusz Paszkiewicz
Hey guys! Coming a little late to the game but I really love the course so much! This are my rough idea-generation sketches. I was trying to create a group of characters that I called the Forest Constructs. They are the undead plant - folk. The Great Forest is using bodies of the fallen men as a fertile soil and creates new organisms. This way they get a new life and become the forest defenders.
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Charles Horton
Hi, recently got an abundance of free time, and figured I'd try to catch up on this course. All my creatures are inspired by the HP Lovecraft story Shadow Over Innsmouth. The story consists of people living in a small fishing town being forced to breed with the "Deep Ones". Sentient beings that exist in the darkest corners of the ocean, predating the humans of the surface. The result is offspring who develop characteristics of the Deep Ones over time.
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Steve Lioy
Here is my assignment. I was aiming towards sea creatures but started integrating the weapons into the character instead of it being an accessory. So I revised it as I went along. I also wanted to keep going toward mech but it seemed to be clashing with the organic of the non mech creatures. I’ll fill up a few more of these pages. Working on a 11x14 “ Bristol pad.
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John Breedy Jr
Hello Scott, This has been a great procedural adjustment for me. I used 9x12 (I have vision issues that limit my peripheral) newsprint. It helps to post because it frees up the doubt from never feeling something is good enough and allows me to access my creativity again. I look forward to hearing from you! Also what are realistic expectations for production when you are working on a project. How many sheets/ideas do they typically look for on a daily or weekly basis, and what is the typical time devoted to each iteration of a concept.
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Ricardo Campos
Hello! Sorry I'm late! Gotta say, never tried this before but i loved it, I feel like i could go on mixing ideas for hours and hours! This 2 took me around 4h. At 1st I was thinking of a bulky piece of matter mixed with fungus and plants, then it evolved, i noticed that humanoid features makes things more relatable and at the same time creepier, so I went there. Is it here we are supposed to post so we can get some feedback @Scott Flanders ? This is for the 1st assignement. Sorry for any errors on my writting, I'm portuguese and I do not write in english a lot.
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Garry Gray
Dang man , you got some skills! Could see these designs being in a game. Looks professional!
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Garry Gray
Took some of my designs I liked on my other page and pushed them even farther. Have like a big boss dude with a sidekick who protects/helps him by staying on his body, surfacing. Went with the harvest man idea but with my own touches :) Had a lot of fun with this!
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Ricardo Campos
Really like it mate, even the way you draw it works pretty well.
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dothrockee
Late to the party, but really digging this so far
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Garry Gray
Nice Work ! I really dig the one that is like an ape with a skull. Pretty cool.
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chaoclypse
Loving the course, @Scott Flanders ! First time seriously designing creatures/characters - Had a really tough time, but it was super fun. I drew up some demon gangsters. Would love for some feedback! Am I on the right track?
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Scott Flanders
Hey Chaoclypse. You're definitely on the right track. Your ideas are pretty fun so far. But I'd recommend doing 3-4 times that many. Keeping the drawings small and focusing less on interior details, and focusing more on your silhouettes. Think of it as an exercise. I want you all to become significantly more sensitive to the ways you're using shape to communicate. Try something for me will ya? Go back and fill in those character sketches until they are effectively pencil silhouettes and then take a step back to evaluate them. Let me know what you discover. Good luck. Glad to have you participating in the course.
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Jake Burns
Hello! Love your art Scott. Joined a little late but got right to work. Heres 2 sheets of sketches; I kept subconsciously drawing bigger but I tried my best to keep them small. Original idea was little forest harvesters that are a cross between mushrooms and arachnids/crustaceans. Experimented a bit with pumpkins but wasnt feeling it. I circled a few designs that im happy with but want to take a bit further.
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Jake Burns
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jacob_f
Each monster comes from it's own 9x12 sheet and I've already gone through a cutting phase to pick out the ones I think are still fun / worth pushing. I left some notes on how I think I want to push each one thinking about colors, effects, and possible behavior. I'd love some feedback on where I need to be pushing things more @Scott Flanders .
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Scott Flanders
These aren't bad Jacob. The point about animation IS definitely worth considering. However, at this stage in your development it is not the highest priority for me when I'm looking at your work. I think what you'd really benefit from at a very base level is a lot more simple gesture drawing. Many of your shapes and the posing of your characters feel somewhat uninformed by reality. To me, this just means that we need to spend some increasing your basic understanding of anatomy. Even a heavily stylized creature such as yours needs to feel anchored in some kind of anatomical or form structure. Whether it's more time looking at roots on a banyan tree, or more time understanding how the muscles of the arm come together, these kind of observations are going to have a big impact on the way you go about inventing forms as you are in your characters here. Overall, good job Jacob. I will likely be getting into this more directly during the next critique video which will be recorded this month.
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jacob_f
Sorry, one more thing. I got some feedback that most of the characters seem like they would be hard to animate / it's hard to tell how they would move. Is that something I should be conscious of at this stage of the game if I wanted to eventually evolve these characters for say, a game?
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jacob_f
Whoops, sorry. Looks like the export was too small for that first one to read the notes. This one should be legible.
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Blaise Chambers
Alrighty! Went back in and filled up that empty space. I think I’m over 80 drawings now! Such a fun creative exercise.
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Scott Flanders
Hell yeah bro. 80 ftw. That's the way to do it man. Puttin' in the work. But make sure you let those wrists have some rest every hour or so ya know? Seriously. It's this kind of drawing that helped me get a lot better, but it will take a toll on your wrists if you're don't pay attention to them when they get irritated. Nice work super hero name man.
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About instructor
Chief Creative Officer at Little Bang Inc. I'm especially passionate about character design, creature design, and sculpting.
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