CrunchyBiteSized Blog

So here’s the finished Gus. It isn’t shown here, but his top crest feathers can be removed and a helmet put on.

Here are some of images of the process of creating the sculpture.

These are model sheets for the roadrunner character, which has been named Gus. These were used to create the final sculpted maquette.

This is stage two in the character design process. Since the last post, I’ve further developed the character visually and developed a bio that outlines the character’s personality. This really helps in the brainstorming sketches, which show more of that personality as well as better define the physicality of the character.. It’s much easier to know how to draw a character if you know how that character acts. It’s particularly useful to base the character loosely on someone you know, or a previously developed character. In this case, I used Maverick and Goose from the movie “Top Gun” for the inspiration for my roadrunner’s persona. He’s a little cocky, but in a likable kinda way. He’s goofy and fun loving. The name Gus was my son’s idea. Kahlin really helped me out there, because most of the time, the toughest part for me in developing a character is coming up with a name.

I have started a new character for my Character Design class. Part of the assignment for this go round is to keep a running journal of my process, so I thought I’d take advantage of this blog for that purpose. Below you’ll find the initial sketches I’ve done for the character. I chose to do a roadrunner, partly because the assignment requires us to use native New Mexican wildlife, and what would be better than the state bird? Also, I wanted to give myself a bit of a challenge for my second model. I thought that a bird would present that challenge. Birds of course are very different from humans, so I thought an anthropomorphic roadrunner would be a nice test. The toughest part at first were the legs. At fist glance, they look very different from our own. It looks like their knees bend backwards, but upon closer inspection and research, it turns out that what appears to be a backward knee is really the ankle, and their knees are closer up towards their arm – or wing – pits. So this made it easier to give the roadrunner the necessary proportions that would allow it to sit. And sitting would be important for this character because I decided to make him an air force fighter pilot. I thought it would be fitting to have a bird that doesn’t fly much, if at all, chose to go into the air force.

Here is the complete development of my jackrabbit maquette. The images begin with some initial sketches, then move on to a rough draft including bio for the character, then intermediate drawings, then the final character sheet. It’s cool to see how the character developed.

This is a character I’m working on in my Animated Character Development class. My first full figure sculpture.  He isn’t painted yet; I wanted some images of him in just flat gray. I’ll post some more images when I’ve completed the painting.