Over the past couple of weeks, besides the research done on bus journeys and breaks, I have been trying to focus on sketching ideas for characters. I found it difficult to just be able to focus on the one character, wanting to experiment between numerous characters.
I sat looking at all the variation of characters at one point as I just seemed to be sketching the same slimline character that I had been used to. Suddenly an idea came to me, there are numerous male versions within gaming and movies, with the females being more often than not overly sexualised. When I did a tester run on the initial drawings as mentioned above I enjoyed attempting to change the male robot into female. Is it possible to change the existing male robots within movies and games into females. I know instantly that DOTA 2 has a fan art base that does this for the hero's within the game already and posts them in the community and online. It has also been done vice-versa with females turned into males. However than has been an emphasis on the femininity of this as the example shows below.
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| Invoker Game Version - Male (Above) |
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| Invoker Female Fan Art Version by by Sieyarelow |
Instantly as you can see, more flesh is shown and breasts are made more prominent, with a lack of clothing compared to the male version, also the colouration for the character has been made lighter and brighter.
Over the next few days I am going to choose a selected male character and attempt to transform them into a female character avoiding using such things as above.
The highlights of the research has been looking at variations of characters both in game and movies and comparing the differences in how female representations have been portrayed. Even though some of the designs have been very strong in terms of what the character is capable of doing, the overall visual concept doesn't always portray that sense of strength.
The downside I find myself being guilty of is continually researching as I find it interesting, as to fit it in currently it is easily done on my mobile. From now on I will be carrying my tablet which is light and portable.
