HORROR COMIC CHARACTERS DESIGN! Chatty, my process video!

Hey everybody, welcome back to The Average. I'm Steph. I'm the Average Artist. Today I'm going to be doing some character design with you. Hopefully I've got my coffee and we're just going to chill and chat and uh draw some characters and [music] hopefully get some characters properly designed. If you've just found my channel, I make horror comics and I'm currently at the stage of doing sort of concepty stuff and thumbnails. So, there's my thumbnails and then I finished a sketchbook. So, I had to start a new one, which kind of annoying cuz I wish I had the thumbnails in one sketchbook. But, yeah, I've nearly finished the thumbnails. I'm at this point now and I have about 20 [music] pages left to thumbnail out. But I got to the point where I was like [music] it would make sense to kind of start thinking about well not just thinking about but like pushing a little bit more of how the characters might look. So I started drawing the characters who are the main characters really. The two sisters there's Jennifer and Callie and Callie is [music] the younger sister. And I started out with these drawings, was not happy, and then just kept pushing different styles. I was getting really happy with this kind of style because it's more simplistic and I think it makes [music] sense to be a little bit more simplistic when you're drawing a comic because it'll make it easier when you go to do it. I really like this style as well. So, I carried on drawing and because this sketchbook, the papers are very thin, had to leave a space in between in case I wanted to color these. And what I did was I picked out my favorite sketches that I've done and I've been drawing them on tracing paper and then sort of coloring them or messing around with maybe the style. So these were my attempts [music] to use alcohol markers and a soft black pencil to line the the line work. I've done this always in the past with my old comic. Yeah. So here's my first ever horror comic, Emily is Burning. And this is how I did it with alcohol markers. I left the [music] character completely white. I don't know why. I mean, these I documented a lot of the creation of this one. And I don't know why I left all the characters like completely white against paper. I think it just look cool, I'm guessing. But yeah, this is my first ever one. And then I did these two sister comics which were going to be like to squeeze we're going to be together in a book [music] but then I decided to just make them two short story horror. This is so and all at once disappearance of Olivia Newbury. And you can see here the black pencil with the alcohol markers. I think this came out quite nice. Just looking back is interesting because I think that I've definitely developed my skill at drawing. Um, if that my draftsmanship would probably be a better thing to say. And this is Wishing on a Star where somebody makes a wish and bad things happen. And then this is my latest horror comic which I did I would say three years ago now. So this is the last one I did and it's called Picture [music] This and it's about a girl that finds an antique frame with a picture of someone that looks like she could be a relative of hers. And then I made the the book look like an actual like maybe [music] picture frame which I thought was really cute. And yeah, so this is the style for that as well. It starts out with the telling of oh there's a sticker. These are the end papers which I really had fun doing because it's about this girl goes to antique store. So I drew all these like things you might find in a antique store as the end paper and then it starts off with like a podcast. But these are the characters and I definitely think really did enjoy this style. So this is with colored pencil again. But yeah, you can kind of see she a little bit goes off model. She a little bit goes off model. And so I just wanted to concentrate on doing the character design a little bit better this time. But yeah, those are my old comics and I'm really proud of them. This one is how many pages did I write the pages on this? I didn't even write the pages. Brilliant. done that before and I forgot to write the pages, but it's about 34 pages this one. So, this comic is going to be hopefully like double the size. So, maybe like this big. I don't know. Which will be really cool cuz it'll be the biggest one I've done for a long time. But yeah, so I'm focusing on the characters. The two sisters are sort of the main characters. They have friends as well, which are a lot of the characters. This is a very like girly girlhood horror comic. But yeah, so I was drawing one of the friends. I was trying to draw her out and I was having um I don't know, a bit of a block on her and I was just drawing the same I found a picture on Pinterest of a girl that kind of looks like what she looks like in my head. So I was like that's perfect. That's a really good like reference image that I can sort of take a little bit from and try and discover what she looks like. I really like this one, but maybe she looks a bit old cuz they are supposed to be teenagers. So, I've been drawing her out a little bit and that's where we're at. I've been taking tracing paper like you saw here and just tracing ones I like and then coloring them in because these in between pages, they are so thin that you can see it blends through the paper. So when I have to like skip pages, it makes sense to kind of stick stuff in. So I think I'm going to do that. I really like this one, this kind of style. And I really like the way that it's colored. So I think I'm going to just steal her and see. And yeah, I like these two. I think it's working. Something there is very interesting, like visually interesting about her. And this is sort of a friend that the older sister discovers through the story. I can't really say much more because I don't want to squeaky squeakiest chair ever. I don't want to spoil anything in case you want to read this. Maybe you don't. Maybe you're like, just tell me the story. But, you know, I've spoiled enough, I think. Also, if you're wondering why I've got plaster on my hand, I dropped a cup today. And to stop it from falling, I tried to grab it with my hands. And of course, it already smashed on the counters, so I grabbed just, you know, a shard of broken china. Brilliant. Good job. Yeah, I really like this style as well. I think I don't know. It's just sometimes when you're looking for a certain style, if you've ever done a project where you have to find like certain characters or like an animation where you have to design something and you spend a while just going through the motion of designing stuff. Sometimes something just clicks and it just works and you're like, "Oh, actually, yeah, I like that." Sometimes it takes longer than other times, but you've just got to push through and uh trust the process. And sometimes it lands you with what you want. See, she looks too simple in this. I don't know. I think I redrew that one and it just doesn't No, don't doesn't work. She is definitely has blonde short hair in my mind. Or maybe Ginger. Could be Ginger. Not sure. Uh, let me just think about it a little bit more. Color her. I think I'm going to color the back so it doesn't smudge the pencil. Also, a really good thing if you draw on um tracing paper. So you can flip it and then look at the proportions and you can see your mistakes. I try to rub out where the pencil isn't. Good job. And it's kind of like when you flip your canvas in Photoshop cuz you can see that it doesn't look right. She does look teenagery, right? She doesn't look too old. Luckily, I have these swatches, but they don't I mean it works. A swatch obviously works, but because this paper is so white and I have not been using white paper, so all of the colors kind of come out a little bit darker, so I have to bear that in mind. Light gold. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay, that looks fine. So, I'm just blocking out the colors. I'm really sorry about the building works. I don't know if you can hear that, but it's just so annoying, but it's a consistent thing. So maybe we can just block it out. No cat meowing this time, which is good. Yeah, it's cute. I like her blondie skin color. Warm beige might work, but it's a bit boring. [laughter] Warm beige. Where are you? Warm beige. And warm beige. Okay, so I would say that's pretty much her. I just need to funny thing is if I use the black on her hair looks weird cuz might be a bit too dark but you leave me alone. I was using this really old like glue stick to glue these down and it was dried out. So, I've ordered some more I've ordered like those roll roll on sticky things, but for now, I'll just washi tape her in and then I'll stick it in later. Eh, whatever. This is kind of like my growing page of characters. I really like her and I really like her. I'm using Pinterest a lot to just stick ideas of characters. I've been finding a lot of like reference images basically. have the two sisters then two friends of one of the sisters then the friend of the other sister. So the youngest sister she will have dark features and then her friends one of them is going to have like short hair but with a fringe like a bob and she's kind of like I would say the comedy relief but she's also you know quite scrappy I guess. So, she's got a short in my head brown hair. Well, that's how I'm distinguishing her. And then the other girl, she's called Karen, funnily enough. I don't know why I decided to call her Karen because she's not going to be a Karen, but she's like a proper girly girl. She will have like long blonde hair. So, Karen, Callie, who is the sister, and Kyle. So, I guess the names give you a bit of a pre-existing idea of like their characters cuz I named her Karen cuz she's a bit of like a girly girl. And then Kyle is a bit of a tomboy, short hair. And they're sort of opposite I guess, but they're like really good friends. It's just going to be fun because they're going to have like sleepovers and stuff and they're going to do like a lot of sort of witchy things. I don't know if you ever did that as a teenager. I definitely did when uh the craft came out. Everyone was doing that as feather stiff as a board. So that's actually like how I introduced these three friends is that they're going to be trying to do that at the sleepover and they're just going to be like this is stupid cuz it is stupid. because obviously it does not work. But yeah, so a lot of instances of them just hanging out in a bedroom kind of vibes and they are definitely friends because they live across the street from each other. They are not friends because they met and we're like we have really we're the same you know they're very different from each other but they are friends because you know when you're young you make friends with people just because of like can you come hang out my house some maybe but they definitely have like a deep friendship even though they're different people which is you know good and uh hopefully they all survive the horror comic What would be really nice to do is like once I get a sort of idea of how these three girls look then to do like an illustration of them together because they are going to be together a lot in the story. So it would make sense to just see like how they look combined if that makes sense. I don't know it's very clear what I'm drawing here but the there's an image of a girl on a bed leaning across. I also don't know whether to use just like a line for a mouth or have an actual like the actual lips showing. I think I like just the line and maybe some color where sort of indicating where the mouth might be. Not sure. Might regret going over this with that. But that's what these pages are for. They're for experimenting. I don't know. I really like the coloring of this girl here where we've got like some purple for shadow and some like pink the blush. I think I want to draw her again. And I really like this pencil line for her hair. I did it here, I think, but it's not as clear. It's sort of very light. Um, yeah, a light coloring, whereas this is like clearly sort of pencil marks, which I think would be really cool, especially for the two sisters who will have dark hair. And maybe you could do like a blue underneath, like when people have like blue tint or a red tint to their hair. Also, it's the '9s, so I'm trying to think, would the eyebrows be very thin for these girls? because they probably would have plugged them out. The older sister, Jennifer, she is definitely she's a bit of a lone bird and she wouldn't necessarily pluck her eyebrows. I think she just wouldn't care about that kind of stuff. But the younger sister is more into that stuff like style, current styles and trends. So, she might have thin eyebrows compared to her sister. It's also like interesting trying to think of how people's noses might look because I really like this straight thin style, but then that doesn't really suit every type of character cuz not everyone is going to have that same nose. So, even though it's fun to draw. If you're wondering what I'm using to draw with, this is just a Tombbo Monograph um mechanical pencil. There, that's what it was. And it's 0.5 HB. I think it's just HB pencil, which is interesting because I usually I don't know. It doesn't feel HB. It feels softer, but is I really like um when the eyes are just hollow like that as well. I just nudged you. Sorry. And yeah, I really like this like just rough pencil mark to indicate the hair. I think it could be really cool. Uh this girl and I think in my head she looks exactly like the character Kyle and then Karen. Yes, there's something there that is definitely that character, but it needs some work. Then I tried to draw Callie, the sister, and it just yeah, it didn't work. Um, but these two characters definitely very opposite, but sort of not. I said this. I said Karen is very girly, but I think Kyle is very girly as well, but she's just more like scrappy, if that makes sense, in any way. She sort of doesn't give as much of a crap. But yeah, I think these these look cute. I think maybe what I'll do is I'll try and draw them again on some paper that I'm going to use actually for the comic. So, this is the Deita comic book paper. I've never used this before for a comic, but I think it would make sense to just start transferring uh some of these characters onto this paper because it's obviously going to be a different color. [snorts] I do have a light box somewhere, which would be useful, but I need to start practicing drawing these characters. So, if I just try to redraw her, that would make sense, wouldn't it? Also, supposedly this paper is very high quality. So, I think the alcohol markers won't bleed as much, so it would be easier to use them. They won't run into each other quite as much. It will also be very fun to try and basically use this paper once I have the thumbnails finished. What I'm going to do is blow them up in Photoshop. Blow them up. That means make them bigger [snorts] [gasps] if you didn't know that. Not blow them up, but just make them bigger into the A5. Do I mean A5? I always get confused. Yes, A5 size. And then what will happen is I will try and sketch them onto bigger paper and make the line work better and make the characters look more like the characters I've designed. and then I'll be able to just do the proper pencils over top. What I've done in the past, which I usually like, is that I I have colored in with printer paper. I've used printer paper for all my old comics. So maybe this will be like a bit of a different style, but I've used printer paper because the ink seeps through for alcohol markers. And then what I've done is I've drawn the lines on top through the colors. So like here you can see it's like seeped through. But when I what I've done in the past is sort of go over the top with the line work over the top of the back of the paper. Then when it comes to scanning in the pages, I scan them in and just in Photoshop flip them back. Of course, this is a double-edged sword because you can see all the mistakes that you've made, but that's kind of how I liked to do it in the past because then you would have like a really clean line and then sort of like this sort of textured quality to some of the some of the um [clears throat] alcohol markers because it looks a little bit more handmade than rather just like really really saturated colors that are perfectly smooth cuz if I've handdrawn something I want you to kind of know that it's handdrawn rather than well you can hand draw in Photoshop but you know what I mean like traditional I want you to see the marks of the the media I'm using. So yeah, that was my explanation for all of that. It might be overthinking and overguilding the lily, but that's just how I've always done it. So this time it might be quite different because I'm using alco markers on this side, but we'll see. A lot of textures in there that I enjoy. Eye is way too big here as well. What would she look like with just like a thin line for a mouth? Really like this sort of jaggedy edge. You can smooth it out a little bit. Um, something lost a bit in this transfer. Something about her character that's not quite coming across. And I think it's sort of this round like this angle of her hair. I really like that. And she looks young as well, which is good cuz she is a teenager. I think they're probably like 16, 15, 16. Then the older sister is like 17, 18. She's super close in age to her younger sister, but they're not as close as you would think. Definitely something here that's missing. Like this round, really round forehead. Maybe it's the lips as well. Just doesn't look right flat like that. I think that's it. Okay. So, Maybe what I'll do now is just color her in just to see what she looks like. Really like this face she's pulling, like putting the lipstick on. Uh, I've used a needle eraser to get rid of most of the pencil marks. Let's see how this looks through the paper. So, it does go through the paper, which is kind of cool. But for this experiment, I'm just going to draw on this side for now. The paper is definitely spreading the ink more than I thought it would. That's something to keep in mind. I guess to wait a little bit longer for it to dry, which is a big issue for me. I'm too impatient. Annoyingly, her eye went massive. [snorts] But maybe I can cover that up with something with the line work. Maybe jelly well. These white jelly roll pens are really handy. So super opaque. Doesn't quite look right. The bleeding of the alcohol markers has made it made it look really strange. But let's see what it looks like after I've finish the pencil. This black pencil can be a bit more forgiving than just pure ink, but it's not totally forgiving. So, you have to be a little bit cautious of how you do the lines. Yeah, I think that just like giant pupil is just ruin how she looks. But yeah, let's just see with some more colors. I always like to exaggerate all the features with some color bit more. [snorts] I mean, maybe she would have freckles. That brown is definitely seeping out too much. I don't know. Let's see what it looks like on the back side. Okay. So, this is how I would have normally in the past colored stuff in, but it's missing like chunks cuz this paper is a little bit thicker, but it could work. So, let's just color in a bit more where we see. I mean, whatever. Let's just as an experiment pretend that that's what's going to be I do like some of the sort of as well like lineless um vibes. Some of these characters had a bit of linelessness to it when I was doing these experiments like her and her. So, I don't know. It's definitely missing something like the quality, but see, let's see. My favorite thing to do with alcohol markers, I have usually like a light lilac that I use for shadows. And maybe it doesn't work for this character cuz I've done her skin quite light, but I do like it for shadows. So, we could just do like shadows under neck hair. Need to do that just before I do the pencils because otherwise it will just smudge. Okay, I definitely like that how she's turned out [laughter] there because her eye looks a little bit more natural. Still missing kind of this vibe. I don't know, maybe it's just the pose of her putting on lipstick that is giving it a bit more life and character. Uh, that could be why I need to do like expression sheets for each of these characters just to get a better understanding of of them. But yeah, she kind of looks cute. That would be Kyle. I really want to look into playing with ' 90s fashion again. So, that would be really fun. Again, here we've got like some areas where it hasn't come through, which is quite cute. I really like that. It just looks like I don't know. I just find it more in like visually interesting. Maybe a bit like, you know, risograph printing looks a bit like unintentional. Intentional. Got to be careful because this pencil does not like alcohol markers. It just completely bleeds into it. So, got to be careful if you want to go over stuff with pencil after using it. Go over stuff with alcohol mark after using the pencil. Yeah, kind of. That's her vibe for sure. I think it's missing like the clip or something in her hair cuz she's definitely like trendy. Yeah. Okay, Karen. Let's draw Karen. You can see like how weirdly different it can look just from doing line art slightly differently cuz it's the exact same alcohol marker. But if you look at this one, she looks completely different. to this one. Here, I've done her quite like small, so I'm going to make her head a little bit bigger. Not too big, but it's fine. She has curly hair here. Blonde. Whoa. Oreo, what's the matter? What's the matter? She has blonde curly hair here, but she doesn't. She naturally has straight hair, but we have sleepover scenes and she's definitely got like those socks in her hair. You like now we have heatless rollers, but back in the day people were out there putting socks in their hair and my remember my friend, she put like a load of tissue in her hair, like wrapped it around little bits of tissue and then tied them like that in her hair. And I was like, that's strange. But then the next day her hair was like perfectly wavy. So, you know, I don't know where she learned that from because it wasn't like we had YouTube all these tutorials tutorials tutorials. So, someone had just told her how to do that and I was like that's pretty cool actually. So, that's what I imagine Karen is going to have in one scene is these like rolled up bits of hair. Let's leave her eyes open for this one cuz in the sketch she's kind of more looking down. And of course she has these like thin ' 90s over plucked eyebrows. I was thinking she would have hoops, but I don't know. Maybe that's too far. Like curly hair and then hoops as well is a bit like Oh yeah, of course people in real life would have that, but maybe it's fit like too too many curly whirly lines to draw. So, lots of lots of um opportunities for tangents there. Definitely see her having like cat wing eyeliner as well, even though she's in school. And she might look older than the other girls because she's always wearing like lipstick and makeup. Is she their age? Okay. Uh that ear looks that ear looks bunky. This is her head. So her ear would be like more flat. Would her ear even be out? Maybe. Maybe not. I kind of like an out ear [snorts] in a drawing. Let's [laughter] see here. You know what? She's cute. I like her like her face here. I'm going to color her in and then see what the background looks like. I think I will have like proper lips. I've been, like I said, sounds stupid, but I've been toying with having a line or proper proper outlines of lips, and I think I will go without proper outlines. cuz I think it just adds something even though it's more to draw. I think it just it looks more intriguing, especially if these girls are going to be messing with lipstick and stuff. You know, that line looks a bit weird, but it is her hair. And maybe to play with like the visual interest, this bit of hair can be a bit lower than that side. bit more visually interesting. I don't know. I think once when I color this in and turn it over, we're going to see her face is going to look so wonky. I just know it. I just know it. Okay, let's uh let's use the needable eraser. Yo, what's the matter? Just take away some of the lines so it doesn't like bleed through. Okay. Um, she's blonde. So, let's see what this color is like. Is that too dark? Maybe. Maybe it is. But then again, I have another blonde charact. I have another [snorts] character. So, let's just try it cuz Oreo. What is the m So, I'm just going to try it cuz we want them to work off each other. Please just ignore the crying cat. He is fine. He's just dramatic. Wait for it to dry and not jump ahead like usual. Rose. Maybe I should write down what color for the skin I'm using. I'm just picking up random skin colors. I don't really know. I'm just I will be testing more what kind of colors I want for each and if they work then I will write them down. I think this yellow works. It's mustard. Mustard on. I'm just waiting for this to dry. Mustard. Okay. Surely it does dry. I don't like some of these. I don't like this green I've used. Feel like I've just picked out the exact same one. Some of these colors are a little bit like primary school color and I don't like that cuz I feel like you don't really see that. It's kind of cool. Um, okay. Whatever. Let's just make it the same color as her top. Would be interesting to actually instead of using the pencil try some inks. [snorts] Know what all this stuff is on this paper. Get off. I'm just going to use my fountain pen for now instead of my dip pen cuz I do like how that looks. Okay. What does her eyes look? Maybe if I draw the ink on this side will come through. Yeah, it's kind of come through. I just think the white is off slightly. Oreo or oi. Stop that. That is a really really pointy shoulder. I need to go play with Warriio, I think, cuz he is crying. Let's just color in her eyes. Looks better. Yeah, this looks ridiculous now on this side. Maybe I look ridiculous before, but it kind of looked okay and now I look silly. And she looks completely different. Definitely got earrings. Something about using inks just makes it look completely different. What do you think? What do you prefer? Let me know. I think this is just has more character. But then again, I've only done one like little test and it was strange. Maybe if I try this side drawing on this side of the ink. I know that's going to probably mess up the other side, but definitely looks more like the character here than whatever that girl is on the other side. I think it was just a bit too stiff with the line as well. Perhaps loose would look better. round out that shoulder a little bit as well. Okay. I mean, yeah, she definitely looks better this side. Bit more loose with the pen. There's a bit more uh careful. Yeah, she looks weird there now. That looks really weird compared to this one. which looks so much better there. I don't know what that was about. So, that's my pen test. I think I just needed to loosen up. It shows you how much difference [music] like it makes to loosen up a little bit cuz what is that? She kind of looks like um the wife of American was it called American Dad? American Dad. That cartoon American guy. Is that right? American Dad. Yeah. Anyway, [music] looks like the mom from that. Whereas this like looks more like the character. [snorts] I was thinking I wanted [music] to do shadow again, but I don't know how well the pen ink takes it. So, you let me know what you prefer. Do you like I think I would obviously use black ink rather than this red ink, but what do you prefer? The ink or the pencil? [music] So, it's this ink and this pencil don't look I mean she sort of looks really really [music] um anemic here. Uh I think the skin color is like a bad choice but I think I'm actually leaning more if we ignore that ink um more to the fountain pen side. I need to just use my nib pen as well. But yeah, uh that's like sort of the process of whereabouts I'm at right now for character design. [music] Let me know what you think because I'm really interested in your thoughts and I like to know what everybody likes obviously cuz [music] sometimes I feel like something looks bad and then everyone's like actually I prefer that. It's it's quite strange how people have different opinions. Um, yeah, I still like her the best. I like her. I like this style. Like, she looks a bit old there, though, that character. So, they are teenagers, so I'm not sure how well that comes across. I do like this drawing. And I really like this style as well. And I don't know how [music] close that will be, but I think I'm just going to keep going. And I'll probably show you guys some more in the future. I'm going to cut her out and her this one out. Flip them around and stick them down. [music] Should have some sticky glue coming soon. Very exciting that. And I think it's [music] just helpful to have like some of the the the ideas I prefer down in one area so I can just sort of point out what I like. And you guys can point out what you [music] like, too. I'm just going to pop these down with washi tape for now. So, okay. Here are some characters. Obviously, I need to draw some full body stuff as well. I can't just be doing portraits all the time, but I suppose mostly they will be No, that's not true. Well, I guess most of the time it will be portraits, but there's going to be a [music] lot of full body stuff from my thumbnails. We already know that. So, I got to be drawing the whole characters. Well, I guess that's it for today. [music] Let me know what you think. Of course, really interested in your thoughts. And uh we'll chat next time. Okay. Thanks for watching. Bye.