Outcast Odyssey: Photoshop Designs - Reference and Design 1

After scanning the sketch book designs into Photoshop for inspiration, I first drew a basic figure to use whilst designing the clothing and main appearance for the characters. I decided to focus on one character at a time so that I do not make similar steam punk designs. I found it hard to keep the proportions of the figure correct through the length of the arms and height of the shoulders. In order to solve this problem I researched into guides with drawing the human figure and photography reference. I found using the site, Pinterest, helped me to easily locate and save these references into organised boards; Through these tutorials I was able to apply my newly found skills into my work for the Outcast Odyssey brief; Using shapes, mainly cylinders and rectangles to plot the structure of the figure.

To make the figure easy to apply clothing to, I added the bottom of the boots and creases in the legs to refer to trousers or jeans. I wanted to reuse the head for the first page of designs in which I used reference from the sketch book work that I had made. I mainly used the first figure from the Warriors theme through the use of the hair and the shape of the face with the addition of a fringe. I wanted to challenge myself further by making the face look aged. I felt that this succeeded with the use of the shape of the eyes, the crease lines under the eyes and along the cheek bones. I wanted to make 3 Warrior characters for this brief, so I decided to create the other two figures before I began designing the clothing. Using the same process as the first figure I had drawn, I created another two that were younger in appearance but differed in the hair and facial features.

Figure 1

For this character design I wanted to base the appearance on a basic warrior type, I felt that narrowing the theme of warrior helped me to focus on a certain style. I wanted the warrior to be simple but effective with using weapons and exploring the lands of Outcast Odyssey; Using inspiration from an adventurer like character crossed with a warrior.  With this theme of Steam Punk I imagined the main colour scheme to be in sepia and desaturated tones along with shades of copper and bronze highlighting the metals added into the designs. I started the design with a very simple approach, adding a metal like glove to his right arm in which I then developed further by adding more to the clothing. I then began to add more detail to the torso and legs with the additional stitching and belt buckles. I felt that these additions were successful through how it referred to the steam punk theme, as seen in my visual mood board. I incorporated the theme of an into my work through ensuring that the design was simple but effective with the use of the boots and clothing on the torso. When using influences from my visual mood board and games such as Bioshock Infinite, I found that the appearance of adventurers were simple with the jackets and trousers in which I wanted to take further and add my own twist to the design. I wanted to take one of these designs further, adding intricate detail and colour to the composition, refining the image further. Adding colour would allow me to improve my skills with the program Photoshop by using different techniques to apply the colour scheme.

Design 1 - Steam Punk Warrior