Dissertation

Stanchfield, W. and Hahn, D. (2013). Drawn to life – Volume 1. Burlington, MA: Focal Press.

This endlessly insightful book gives many invaluable tips and tricks from Disney on how to make the drawings and character have more personality and life. That being said, it has not got and information specifically helpful to the topic of this dissertation. At least none that directly correlates with the research.

This brings with it a good question, if the core 3 shapes are so important within designing for animation why are they not mentioned loudly within this book? This may just be down to the fact that this book isn’t aimed at the actual design aspects of character within animations. It more goes into the work behind the final design. Honing the skills important to be able to create characters. Alternatively, it may be that the ideas of the shapes in relation to character hierarchy and personality are simply not something that is deemed to be relevant for the aim of this book. Or not considered by the author as one of the key things needed in designing a character with appeal.

Brain, D., 2006 Gardner’s guide to drawing for animation. Washington, DC: G. Gardner

As a book for the technical research on how to better draw objects and characters for animation this is a useful resource. However, there was not any relevant information that could be used to further this dissertation project as it does not so much focus on the ideas behind the drawing, rather it explores the technical drawing of actual people. This in the long run would assist in the creation of characters to a higher standard but it is not something that is particularly relevant to this project.

The only thing that was helpful was in section 3, page 88 – Simplified parts of the body. Even then, this is only useful for the re-drawing of the chosen characters quickly.

Ponyo

Although Ponyo from Studio Ghibli’s Ponyo (2008) is a child and so her design is always more likely to be more circular than others, it seemed a reasonable choice to make. Especially in relation to the purpose of these experiments. Which is the result of the redesigning of the selected characters.

Ponyo

Perceived Personality: Curious, smart, caring, resourceful, daring
Role: Heroin, love interest
Shape:

(BREAKDOWN1)

 

(BREAKDOWN2)

 

(BREAKDOWN3)

 

Colour:

(COLOUR)

 

Red: Danger
Orange: Energy
White: Innocence

Dug

Dug from Disney Pixar Up (2009) is another very obviously shaped character. Although a lot of his features are rounded to make him more appealing, Dug is essentially just squares.

Dug

Perceived Personality:
Role: Comic Relief,
Shape:

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Colour:

 

Browns: The colours of the actual dog breed
Red: Eye-catching, obviously not meant to be there. No other real meaning to the colour. The red also lets the audience know that something not quite right is going on with the dog and in turn the area itself. Including the man who put the collar on the dog in the first place.