Ambition Project: Storytelling Illustration (ft. Anna Korova)
During this period, I've been working on my ambition project which involved storytelling using an illustration as a medium. In this project , I will take you through my entire process from start to finish. I will also explain the decisions I made and how it affected my work along the way, as well as the feedback I've received throughout the period.
MOODBOARD + STYELBOARD
The character I was gonna use for this project was "Anna Korova". She was a character I had to design for another project. Anna already had a concept according to my client. He wanted Anne to have a versatile vest/jacket and something that would fit a workshop/pilot-vibe. It was already clear that Anna needed to have black hair, according to my client. He also requested for Anna to have a short bob-cut hairstyle. So I immediately found the right one for my moodboard, along with some different styles of jumpsuits and boots. I chose this outfit for Anna because she needed clothes to get dirty with since she often works in her workshop (and also needed clothes with multiple layers).
I gathered a bunch of references at first and then picked out the ones I like the most to use for Anna's final design.
As for the style, I usually go with a line art with line weight on theme and some basic shading and lighting. This time, I decided to go with a "lineless" art style. I stumbled upon the game Momodora and found out about their lineless art style. I really liked their art style and so I used it for my style board to later on implement it on my final work. Of course I found other art that had a similar lineless style, but I was moslty inspired by Momodora.
ANNA KOROVA'S CHARACTER SHEET
I started off with making Anna's character sheet first. This consisted of 4 pages: Full body profile (front and back), facial expressions, pose variations, and a detailed sheet.
I chose to make this sheet look "sketchy" on purpose because the character sheet wasn't my main focus.I also didn't want to spend too much time making things look clean for the character sheet. The sheet was only a guide to tell the audience who the character is what she looks like and what her personality is. But it was a good thing to make one, because a character sheet can usually tell more about a character rather than one illustration. You'll get more insight and info about the character because you also get to add a description to it.
FINAL ILLUSTRATION - THUMBNAILING
After I finished making the character sheet, I started thumbnailing based on what story I want to tell for the final illustration. I was struggling on what to draw for the final illustration and got stuck in my work. So I asked one of my teachers for feedback on how I could start on drawing. He told me to draw out a mindmap of ideas for what I could draw for the final illustration, so I started writing some ideas down.
I like drawing the facial expressions on the character sheet (especially the injured one) and wanted to work more with facial expression in my final work. I was also thinking of doing some action poses, so I thought that implementing gun violence in my work would be exciting.
I work with Clip Studio Paint, and Clip Studio has it's own asset store that every user can make use of. I downloaded a collection of gun-poses to work with, as seen in the image below.
So for the thumbnailing, I used Gun pose 8, 3 and 24, as you can see below.
From top to bottom and left to right: pose 24, 8, 3.
THUMBNAIL 1
For thumbnail 1 I had this idea where Anna would confront an enemy that was attacking the spaceship by running around the corner and attacking them head-on. I liked the perspective in this thumbnail, however I had a hard time coming up with the interior design for the scene. So I let this sit in the drafts.
For thumbnail 1 I had this idea where Anna would confront an enemy that was attacking the spaceship by running around the corner and attacking them head-on. I liked the perspective in this thumbnail, however I had a hard time coming up with the interior design for the scene. So I let this sit in the drafts.
THUMBNAIL 2
FINAL ILLUSTRATION - SKETCHING + LINE ART
I decided to go with the 2nd thumbnail and worked on the sketch some more, refining the character to determine its appearance in this scene. I sketched out her clothes first, of course and asked my teacher for some feedback on what else I could add to the character. The feedback I receievd was to add a lot of "action" elements. For e.g. torn/dirty clothing, wounds and bruises etc. So I started sketching out the little details on her clothes and face.
After sketching out the details I wanted for Anna, I resized the character a little bit to make it bigger and started on the line art.
FINAL ILLUSTRATION - COLORING + SHADING
I followed the style I wanted to go for. I saw that the style for Momodora was mostly out of cellshading, so I applied that shading technique on to my final illustration. As for the colors, I simply used the eyedropper tool to get the colors I used for Anna's character sheet.
During the coloring process, I also decide to add the wounds and bruises to Anna, as well as some extra tears and ripped elements to show that her clothing is all torn from fighting in the wilderness.
Now, for the "lineless" effect on the character, all I did was color in the line art the same color as where they touch on the character. So for e.g. The lines where they touch the hair, I color the line art the same color as her hair.
Next, I worked on the background. I jumped over to Procreate because I made the mistake to merge all background elements together. In Procreate, I also used the gradient tool to color the background.
I selected the foreground to separate it with the background so I could blur the background.
From left to right: foreground with no blur, foregroud with blur, foreground with no blur and no character.
FINAL ILLUSTRATION - ADDING THE FX AND LIGHTS
For the final step, I decided to add some extra "FX" to spice up the illustration a little bit more. I started off by adding motion blur to Anna. This will give the effect that she's somewhat moving in the picture instead of just "floating" in the air. I then added some debris to the groun so it would give the impression that there is some durt and dust flying around while she falls.
After that, I added some laser shots that are supposed to hit Anna. If you look closely, there is one hitting right across her calves.
The background looked a little boring, even after adding the laser shots. So I decided to add some green bushes in the foreground so it wouldn't look too monotonous. Last but not least, I added some light source from the right as well to match Anna's shading.
The background looked a little boring, even after adding the laser shots. So I decided to add some green bushes in the foreground so it wouldn't look too monotonous. Last but not least, I added some light source from the right as well to match Anna's shading.
FINAL ILLUSTRATION - FINAL PRODUCT
Making this illustration was quite the tedious journey. I noticed that I was struggling a bit with starting to draw because I had a hard time getting my ideas out. Not to mention that the "lineless" style and the cellshading was also quitw new to me. I had fun trying out that art style and I might even use it more often in the near future!
I'd like to say that I learned quite a lot from this project and that the feedback I've received was very helpful. And I'm quite pleased with the results~!
I'd like to say that I learned quite a lot from this project and that the feedback I've received was very helpful. And I'm quite pleased with the results~!
