Before you start designing your character, there’s a lot of preparation that needs to take place. Many amateur artists find their character concept art falling short because they jump straight into the design portion of the process.
While everyone has made this mistake at some point, you probably want to know exactly how you can go about furthering your current skills. Here are some tips on how to design better concept art characters and take your designs to the next level.
How to Design Better Character Concept Art
Set the Scene
Before you get started on actually designing your character, it’s important to set the scene. You should have a basic idea of the world that your character will be living in. If you’re creating this world from scratch, then you take the time to write down some details and any other character design ideas you might have. When you know exactly how a character will fit into a world, then you can better design how they will look.
Do Your Research
Once you have an idea of what your world will include, it’s important that you do some research. It may seem like an extra tedious step, but for novice artists, collecting visual references will help you understand your character better.
You can do research on similar video games or movies, or you could take inspiration from photographs or videos from the real world based on the game’s time period. It’s important to note that research is to give you inspiration and a better understanding of the setting of the game, but it is not for you to copy other artists’ work.
Start with the Outline
After your research and planning process is complete, it’s time to start designing. To start, you should try working on the posing or outline of the character. From there, you can begin adding basic details to add more shape to the figure.
After you have selected one out of your outline designs, then you move forward with the rest of the design process.
Add the Details
Next is the fun part: adding the details! All of the research that you did at the beginning of this process should start to pay off. As you add details, you should start to get a clear vision of who your character will become.
Is your character an old, weathered cowboy? Here is where you’ll add the details of his luscious mustache and the wrinkles just by the eye. These small details really add up to create a perfect picture of your character.
Enhance Your Skills
You may feel that your skills aren’t quite up to par, especially in the area of adding those details that truly take your concept art characters to a professional level. This is perfectly normal! At some point, you’ll want to look into other ways that you can enhance your skills.
One of the best ways that you can level up your design skills is by pursuing education from professionals within the field. Luckily, you have more options today than ever before!
Character Concept Art Education
Finding someone who has the knowledge and experience to show you how to take your concept art characters from beginner to expert can be difficult. Often, these types of classes are available at colleges, which require enrollment and tuition. The overall costs and inconvenience of in-person classes hinder many artists from furthering their skills and education. So, what can you do?
Vertex School offers an online Character Concept Design Bootcamp that you can take without enrolling in a college and is a fraction of the price. This Workshop shows you all of the skill sets and workflows needed to create a convincing set of armor.
By the end of the course, you’ll:
- Have improved understanding of how concept art fits into the game development pipeline
- Have an improved understanding of character design for AAA games
- Know what skills are important to showcase in your portfolio
- Have created your own portfolio-ready character
Character Concept Design Overview
This course is broken down into 6 easy-to-understand modules. Here is a bit of what you can expect:
Module 1: Research & Reference
Module 2: Sketching the Basic Shapes
Module 3: Designing Your Character
Module 4: Painting the Details
Module 5: Lighting & Rendering Techniques
Module 6: Presentation for Clients
Frequently Asked Questions
You may be wondering how you can attend an art course without enrolling in a college, and you may also have other questions. Here are some of the most commonly asked questions about the course.
What is the course format?
Vertex School is a one-of-a-kind alternative to expensive college degrees. The primary goal is to make art and design education widely available to all who may not have access to college classes.
All Vertex School classes are hosted online in a pre-recorded format, so you can take the information at your own pace. Each course is taught by a professional within the specified industry, and all student work is critiqued by highly skilled Teaching Assistants. You’ll also have access to the Teaching Assistants for answering any questions you might have and a private Discord group to discuss with peers.
What software do I need?
Software and materials needed include: Photoshop, ZBrush and 3D packages such as Maya, 3DS Max, Modo, or else should be known to follow along
What is the refund policy?
Vertex School strives to create happy artists. Your investment is fully backed by the 15-day money-back guarantee. For more information on the refund policy, refer to this page and scroll down to the frequently asked questions.
How long will I have access to the course?
When you learn from Vertex School, you’ll have lifetime access to the workshop videos. This allows you to refer back to them again and again as many times as you need to.
Take the Next Step
Enhancing your skills to achieve professional quality characters doesn’t need to be a lengthy process of obtaining a degree, and it doesn’t need to cost years of savings. With Vertex School, you can have a quality education from top professionals, the convenience of self-paced learning, and a simple process to get started at a fraction of the cost.
Ready to start your Character Concept Design Bootcamp?