Drawing with Shapes in Illustrator
The above character was a design I made with basic shapes based off of a reference image. To create the design I used the various shape tools as well as the pathfinder tool to remove parts of the basic shapes. I didn’t do this for the whole character however as I got carried away with manipulating the anchor points of the shapes using the direct selection tool. The character was an interpretation of the main character from Watchdogs. To make sure I got most of the character’s appearance right I used a reference image which I imported into Illustrator and placed next to my canvas as seen below. I feel like this design turned out very well considering that I had limited ways of making the design. However, if I were to improve the design I would like to add more detail to parts of the clothing.
This design was my second attempt at making a character while using or manipulating basic shapes. This character is intended to be used in my game for the Introduction to Game Engines so I had more freedom in terms of the appearance. However, I did still use a reference image (shown below) as I wanted to use a similar visual style to 3D stealth games like Splinter Cell but replicated in a 2D game. The character was made using the same methods as I used for the Watchdogs design. I think the design is great as a basis for the character although I do want to add more details to the character.
I will probably use this method of making a 2D character for my assignment but I won’t exclusively use this as I feel this used in conjunction with other methods will allow me to make a better quality piece of 2D art.