Character Design: Writing and Designing More Memorable Characters

1. Introduction: Hello. My name is Michelle Tiberias. I'm an illustrator, cartoonist and traveller based in Sunny Tampa, Florida Like many other creatives, I'm really passionate about telling stories. And in my opinion, one of the most important aspects to telling a good, rich, deep story that touches people in a meaningful way is by crafting characters that are complex, interesting and overall memorable. In this class, we're going to spend a lot of time not only discussing the appearance, the overall look and feel of your character, but also the concept behind your character, the inner workings. We're gonna try our best to get into the headspace of your character because the more we're able to develop the character internally, the more memorable that character will be and the more it will touch the hearts of your audiences. Well conceptualized and executed characters allow audiences to create a greater emotional investment in a story, and a fully fleshed out and memorably written character allows an individual to experience the story through the character's perspective and essentially helps an audience member have an entirely new experience that they otherwise wouldn't be ableto have just one of the best things about getting lost in a story throughout this class will be analyzing what makes a character memorable and then putting our discoveries to practice by writing a character, brief sketching and drawing her character and then finally compiling everything into a character biography. Everything that will be going over today can either be applied to existing characters that you've already created so that you can build them out Mawr, or you can take these principles and create a character completely from scratch. So if you're a cartoonist, animator or illustrator that wants Teoh create more thoughtful, compelling and memorable characters that audiences and viewers will remember for years to come, this is the class for you. I'm really excited to embark on this character creation journey with you. I think we're gonna learn a lot of useful things. So if this class interests you, let's head on over to the next video and get started 2. What Makes a Character Memorable?: Now let's spend some time attempting to answer the complicated question of what makes a character memorable. The reason why this question is complicated is because everyone has different reasons for remembering characters that captivated them in one way or another. There's really no harder fast rules, since our connection to fictional characters is oftentimes very personal. So I do encourage you to contemplate this deeply and Teoh figure out for yourself why it is that the characters that you love are so memorable to you personally, I think the things that make a character most memorable are often times non physical and have more to do with the way that character is written and the way that they act, interact with their environment, and you'll see that the four bullet points listed here mostly relate to that. So first you want to make sure that your character is authentic and to make sure that your character is authentic, you can ask yourself, Does this character seem like a real person? Do they interact with their environmental way that is realistic, or do they react to the events around them in a way that is believable? Next, let's discuss relatability and the question you should ask yourself, There is Can you empathize with this character's problems? Does the conflict in your character's life seem real to you? And do you care enough about this character to want to see how things end or to see whether or not their problems get resolved or not? Next, let's talk about emotional range or emotional complexity. The question you want to ask yourself here is, Does this character go through a wide range of emotions? Do we get to witness this character's highest highs and lowest lows? And do we get to experience this character maybe feeling more than one emotion at the same time, or perhaps watching their feelings change about a situation over time? And finally, you want to make sure that your character exhibits distinctive traits. So not only is this behavioral and mental and psychological, but also physical, the question you're gonna want to ask yourself Here is West special about this character that sets them apart from other characters that are similar. How does your character break out of the mold or break stereotypes? Does your character have any unusual hobbies or behaviors or ticks or even physical traits that you wouldn't necessarily expect knowing their personality or their job or any other aspect of themselves. What are the things that are most surprising about your character, and how can you highlight those things? There are plenty of questions that you should continue toe. Ask yourself while you're designing your character, these air just a few to get you started. And I think the most pertinent questions to ensure that your character is memorable. So even though it can be hard to answer the question of what is a memorable character, sometimes the easiest way to figure that out is by determining what it isn't. And in my opinion, I think the least memorable characters tend to be the Mary Sue or Gary Stew. The Mary Sue is a writing trope where in a fictional character is hyper idealized and void of any flaws whatsoever. These are the kinds of characters that can seemingly do no wrong or always seem to know exactly what to do or say in any specific situation. And in my opinion, the Mary Sue is exactly what you should avoid when trying to create a character that is memorable to other people and Here's a breakdown of why I think you should avoid the Mary Sue using the four bullet points that we discussed earlier. Firstly, Mary Caesar, not authentic they don't resemble were real people because they are perfect and no riel living person is without flaws. Next, Mary Sue isn't relatable because people make mistakes. And it's very difficult, if not impossible, to relate to a character that always does the right thing. No matter what. Mary Sue also oftentimes exhibits a very limited emotional range because Mary sues don't typically express emotions like rage, jealousy, regrets, disappointment or other negative emotions. And lastly, Mary sues oftentimes don't have distinctive traits, because not only are they designed to be conventionally attractive in most cases, they also don't indulge in quirky habits or strange devices or any other atypical behaviors that would set them apart from other characters that are similar to them, ensuring that your character has a lot of authenticity. Relatability, a wide emotional range and distinctive traits, will mean that your character will not only resonate with viewers on an emotional level, viewers will care about your character more and will commit Teoh remembering that character long after the story is over. And now whenever you're ready, let's continue on to the next lesson 3. The Most ____ Character: When it comes to character design, a lot of people are tempted to create most intelligent character, the toughest character, the most hilarious character possible. And so I want to answer the question. Should I aim to make the most character? The short answer to this question isn't no. A long answer to this question is no, because there's no such thing as the most smart, most tough for the most funny character. Since all of those trades are subject to personal opinion, individuals all have unique opinions on what makes a character the most smart, most tough, the most funny etcetera. Moreover, relying too heavily on one specific trait can actually make your character stale, stereotypical and harder to remember. Which is exactly what we don't want. However, giving your character a variety of traits both negative and positive, will make your character more well rounded, which will resonate deeper with an audience and make a character more authentic, relatable, emotionally complex and distinctive. In short, more memorable. Let's try putting this to practice. Let's say I decided to create the coolest character ever, So then I might take some time Teoh try to figure out what exactly makes a character really , really cool. Maybe I compile a small list of all the things that I happen to think really cool. And so on that list. We've got sunglasses, a smoking habit in a NBAF, third by trivialities, cool clothes and hair and somebody that's maybe emotionally distant. The trouble with this method of creating characters is flawed, though, because there are literally dozens of already cool characters that other authors have already tried to make as cool as possible, which means that my character won't be very memorable at all. So what can we do to improve our cool character? We can introduce new traits that break the mold and modify existing trades. So taking the exact same list room before we're going to make some new additions. First, the sunglasses. I've decided that my character does wear sunglasses, but they wear sunglasses all the time because they make the character feel safe and hidden from the world. Maybe this character likes to avoid making eye contact with people because they have trust issues. Next, let's address a smoking habit. This character actually prefers to use a vaporizer because they want to maintain a cool image, but they're also worried about lung cancer and other smoking related diseases. The fact that they're worried about their health, some could argue, is kind of un cool, since cool, people tend not to worry about things. So this adds an extra layer of dimension to our character. Next, across out the phrase UNB bothered by trivialities. And this is because I've decided that our character pretends to be on bothered by trivialities but secretly hasn't many concerns ranging from small and large, and they don't tell anyone except for their pet off. This shows that are cool character is actually surprisingly insecure, so much so that they're afraid. Teoh tell a real life person about their problems, for fear of judgment. Let's go to the cool clothes and cool hair. So I've decided that this cool character still has a very cool appearance. But it takes two hours every day for them to get ready, meaning that this image that they've created for themselves is very carefully cultivated on . Perhaps maybe are cool. Character is a little bit bane, and for the last item on the list, I've actually crossed out emotionally distant because although our character might be distant with most people on, especially strangers. This cool character is actually deeply emotionally invested in their family and close friends. Now we've introduced new traits that make our character more dimensional, interesting, complicated and, as a result, more memorable than this is good news, because this means that if you have any existing characters that are a little stale or stereotypical, you can introduce new traits that break whatever stereotypical mold they might be in and modify existing trades to make them more interesting and memorable. 4. Collecting and Analyzing Reference Images: So let's talk about the first step for creating memorable characters, which begins with gathering reference and resource material for inspiration. While, of course, it's important to use your imagination when coming up with your own unique and memorable characters. Often times it helps to get inspiration from real people. And that's where using photographic references come in and finding this sort of reference material and even connecting with people living these lives themselves can help us get a better understanding off the lives they lead and perhaps with life of our new character might be like. And I think this is especially important when creating a memorable character because oftentimes the most standard generic and somewhat boring characters that are not very memorable sort of all look the same and lead the same sort of lives. They become tropes, and that's really what makes them sort of hard to remember by doing as much research as possible about the different lives the potential characters could lead. You're really going Teoh Rawdon, not only your own creative horizons, but also the potential that your new character might have so definitely pushed yourself to imagine a character from a variety of different walks of life. Ask yourself, what would my character we like if they were older or younger if they were richer or poorer ? Coming up with different iterations of a character is really helpful, So be sure to collect images of people from a wide variety of different ages. Races, ethnicities, religions, genders, romantic and sexual orientations, etcetera. One tool that a lot of artists like to use is Pinterest, which you can see on the screen right now. Personally, I prefer to keep a couple of files on my desktop, and it's helpful. Teoh have different categories when you're collecting your files. So, for example, I have a file just for different faces. I have a file for different people imposes. I have a file for anatomy, and I have various files for costumes and fashion inspiration. Of course, at the end of the day, it's most important that you develop an organizational system that works for you. And if you prefer to avoid using digital tools and instead like to just collect physical pictures and images, then by all means do that instead. And also don't be afraid to get specific. For instance, I had a character that I was working on recently. That was a young woman that rode around on a scooter, and so I went ahead and collected reference images and materials of women writing scooters . And that way it was easier for me to not only visualize this character riding on a scooter , but also how she might feel while on a scooter and how it might impact her lifestyle. Another thing you might notice is that the most memorable looking people often times have really interesting and specific physical characteristics. And these physical trades that stay in our minds can range anywhere from having prominent facial features like having a large nose or penetrating eyes. Or it could be the way that a character styles themselves the particular makeup or face paint or facial scarring that they might have. And again, it's important to ask yourself, How do these traits relate to this character's life and personality? Perhaps a character with very large eyes could be observant about the world around them, whereas a person with small ears maybe could be a bad listener. What are some tips that you have when it comes to collecting reference images and what are some of the things that you find particularly interesting and memorable when it comes to seeing real life, people let me know. I'm curious, and so much for watching this video. And whenever you're ready, let's continue on to the next one. 5. Writing a Character Brief: in this video, we're going to talk about coming up with important details for your character and then using those details to write a character brief. The most important thing that I want you to take away from this particular lesson is the value of analyzing your character, imagining their life, what's inside their head and hearts and really getting to the root of who they are, what they believe in and what they want to accomplish. The more that you're able to get inside your character's head and figure out what their lives are like and why they make the certain choices that they make, the easier it will be for you to portray your character to your audiences as a believable and emotionally resonant character. One of the most important things that will help you flesh out your character is taking time out of your day to really think deeply about your character's life. I like to do this when I'm in the shower when I'm driving, when I'm out taking a walk. But it can also be helpful. Teoh Macon Exercise out of it, almost like a meditation aim to set aside 10 to 20 minutes of time in your schedule and go to a quiet place where you will be able to concentrate, get comfortable but not too comfortable that you might fall asleep. Imagine a full day in the life of your character from the moment they wake up to when they fall asleep at the end of the day. Think about things like maybe how they feel when they first wake up. Are they tired or energized? What are some of the things that they do to get ready for the day? What do they eat for breakfast? What is their daily commute light? What are the daily tasks that they must do? What kind of interactions do they have with the people or animals around them? If and when they take breaks or have snacks, what does that look like? How do they spend that time and how do they unwind to relax after a long day? What do they typically eat for dinner? Do they eat alone or surrounded by other people? What kind of evening hobbies do they like to indulge in? And then finally, what is their bedtime routine? What are the final things that they do to get ready for bed. Once you've finished visualizing your characters day start taking down notes about the various details and events that you've imagined, right, everything you can remember, even little things like she brushes her teeth in a dirty bathroom. These seemingly minor details can be analysed later to extract greater meaning about the character. So, for instance, why is her bathroom dirty? Is she too lazy to clean it? Does she not have enough time in her busy schedule? Does she have an inconsiderate roommate that neglected to clean it even though it was their turn? So along that vein, you're gonna take a few minutes to process and analyze your visualization and notes. You're going to continue to ask yourself, varies questions about the character and the more questions that you can answer, the closer and closer you'll get to reaching the heart of this character. Once you finish visualizing and analyzing all the details that you can recall from the exercise, use it to draft a 1 to 2 page character. Brief things that you might want to include in your breathe would be a full name and age gender what they do for work or where they go to school, any skills they might have their socioeconomic status, any important relationships. They might have their level of education, core personality traits, personal goals they might have and any belief systems such as personal philosophies or religions that they might prescribe to. Of course, this list is just to help you get started. It's OK if you leave some things out or add new things that aren't listed here. Just be sure to include the information that is most vital to knowing your character. And sometimes those things can be seemingly unimportant to outsiders, like the fact that they're a proud cat mom. Sometimes very little specific details like that can give you a lot of insight into what kind of person your character might be. And so here is an example of a character brief that I drafted using the visualization exercise. I won't read the whole thing to you, but feel free to pause this video if you're interested in reading it yourself. Using some of the information listed in the character, Brief will be able to design, look and feel of this character. Of course, not everything in the character brief will visually relay in the character design, but there's certainly details there that you'll be able to pull out. So, for example, my character is a Catholic high school students social most likely have a Catholic schoolgirl uniform. I've also mentioned that she was in a car accident and has a scar on her leg, so that will be another thing to consider while designing this character in the next video , we'll talk about collecting reference images and how they can help you craft a visually interesting character. So as soon as you're ready, let's move on to the next video. 6. Shape Based Design: Welcome to the next video. In this section, we're going to talk about shape based character design and how you can use basic shapes to enforce specific character traits within your character. So first, let's go over the three basic shapes, all shapes used to build characters can essentially be broken down to either squares, circles or triangles, and each shape has a set of associated character traits. The cool thing about these character traits is that they could be usually represented by the shapes themselves. So, for instance, if we look at the square, the character traits associated with the square are grounded nous, unyielding nous, stubbornness and stability. And that's because the square itself is a pretty solid shape. It's even on all science, and when we often times he cubes or squares in real life, they can be pretty foundational and used to create building blocks. Think of the square, a sort of like a brick or concrete slab. Characters that have a square sort of design are sometimes hard to break down emotionally or even physically. Character traits based on the circle tend to be more soothing, pleasant, harmonious and cooperative because the circle itself has no harsh edges. Oftentimes, characters that have a more circular design time to be more go with the flow and conflict avoidant and in general seem to be a little bit nicer. Compared to square or triangle based characters. Triangular character traits tend to be more harsh, difficult, rough. And if the character design has an inverted triangle or has uneven science, this could imply possible instability within the character, Since the angles of the triangle jut out in a way that is more jarring than out of the square. This can imply a sort of prickliness within a character to sign. And if you take some time to really think about it, there's a lot of villains out there, especially an animation, and in comics are designed to have more triangular traits. Often times love interests and protagonists will have circular traits, and supporting characters will have square traits. But this is on a hard and fast rule, so don't let that limit you in any way. You'll free to experiment with a variety of different trades for each of your characters, regardless of whether or not they're the protagonist antagonised supporting character or love interest. I mentioned this more just so that you could be aware of it. As you analyze character design from comics and animation, it's also important to keep in mind that you can manipulate the shapes. You don't have to adhere strictly to perfect circles, squares or triangles. So, for example, you can stretch out a circle to make an oval and a square to make a rectangle. You can also rotate a square to make a diamond shape and feel free to also take out slices or chunks out of shapes to create new ones like here. We took out a triangular shaped from the circle to create a strong profile with a large nose and chin that juts out slightly. Typically, this shape based form of character design is most often talked about with simpler, more cartoony character designs. But I feel like it's important to mention that this kind of shape language can be helpful even if you have more of a semi realistic style. In order to make this work, you're gonna have to manipulate the shapes a little bit, and you can see we're incorporating elements of each to help visually get the same messages across. So regardless of what kind of style you work in. Applying shape based designed to your characters can really convey specific messages about your character. And keep in mind that on top of manipulating shapes, you can also combine them together to convey more layered, complicated messages about your character. When it comes to character design, which of the Three Shapes is your favorite? Let me know. Whenever you're ready, let's continue on to the next lesson. 7. Rough Exploratory Sketches: Now that you've collected your reference images, use them as a starting point for your exploratory sketches at the stage. You should be prioritizing quantity over quality. The more sketches that you produce, the more opportunities you'll have to explore different facets of this character and make new discoveries about them. So don't worry about making the most refined or polished drawings. It's OK if they're rough and fast. You want to also make sure that there is a wide range and variety and all of your drawings . Make sure that each drawing is slightly different from the rest, even if it's just a small change experiment with different facial features, body types, different races, hairstyles, facial expressions and clothing options. You can also sketch different scenarios, whether it's them indulging in different hobbies that they enjoy or interacting with other characters. Keep in mind that you won't use every single sketch that you create during this face, so you really can go as crazy as you want. Stretch yourself to imagine your character in absurd or even unlikely situations. Through the sketching process, you'll be able to learn new things about this character. The spontaneity of this process allows you to come up with ideas on the spot, which can keep your character from becoming too stale or to meticulously thought out. Feel free to work in whichever medium you feel most comfortable in, whether that's using digital tools and software or with pencil and paper. And keep in mind that the tools that you're used don't have to be that fancy, either. You can see here that I used regular lined paper and a ballpoint pen to make my sketches. Keep making exploratory sketches until you reach a point where you start noticing patterns in the way that you draw this character when you start finding a way to draw them in a way that feels right for them and also feels right for you as a creator. So, for example, with this character, I felt as though short hair and large hoop earings really suited her. And as I kept drawing her over and over again with that same hairstyle and earrings in Affirmed that I was making the right choices about this character for me as an artist, which is another great thing about the exploratory sketch face, it allows you to build your confidence up in the design of the character as well. Hopefully you'll continue to make exploratory sketches about your character even after you finished the design, but it's especially crucial to do these kinds of exploration sketches early on. What sort of things do you like to draw when you're making exploratory sketches? Do you prefer to focus on fashion, anatomy, facial expressions, different situations they might be in? Let me know. Thanks for watching. And whenever you're ready, let's continue on to the next video. 8. Memorable Poses: one mistake that a lot of people make is rendering their character in this kind of post that you can see here oppose. That is pretty rigid and symmetrical. This kind of poses not only stiff and boring, it doesn't really convey any meaningful information about the character. And a good, memorable pose will be able to give us insight into what a character is thinking or feeling at any given moment. So use this as a standard for what to avoid. If done correctly, though, you'll be able to convey a variety of different emotions through your posing and body language like confusion or uncertainty, happiness and confidence. Relax, ation the stress or disappointment. Can curiosity notice how each of these stances convey the character, distributing their weight unevenly, versus the example on the far left, where our character is standing completely upright and distributing their weight perfectly evenly between both feet? Most of the time, it's actually unnatural for a person to stand completely, operate with their weight evenly distributed between both feet, people put the majority of their weight on one leg and then used the other secondarily for a little extra support. This unevenness between the pelvis and the shoulders is more commonly referred to as contra Post toe, which is Italian for counter pose is uneven. Weight distribution oftentimes also causes the pelvis to be at a tilt, which is clearly evident in the five examples on the right, but not at all on the example in the far left. So just remember that when it comes to creating memorable and motive and interesting poses , keep the stance is asymmetrical and distribute the way unevenly between both legs. It also really helps to be more aware of standing in general. So any time that you find yourself standing, whether it's waiting for the elevator to calm or if you're waiting in line at the grocery store or if you're stopping at a crosswalk, take time to be a more aware of your body on the things that you do while you stand. Are you crossing your arms? Do your feet face inward or outward? Are your shoulders raised or lowered or is one raised on the other lowered? Becoming more aware of your own body and the stances that you take depending on how you feel and what you're doing while standing up will help you have a better grasp of what hoses will be asked for your character. And now, whenever you're ready, let's continue on to the next lesson. 9. Drawing Your Character: welcome back in this video, we're going to do our best to establish a consistent look and feel for our character with more refined drawings. At this point, you should have a better understanding of what your character is about and how they should look and feel. And at this time, it would be a good idea to not only revisit your character brief to refresh your memory and to try to remember any specific interesting details about your character. But also go back to your exploratory sketches from your exploratory sketches. See if you can find any particular poses, costumes or facial expressions that really interest you. The one really great thing about exploratory sketch drawings is that because they're faster , they tend to be looser and have more energy in them. So for your room or refined drawing stage, what you'll want to do is try to capture at loose energy from your exploratory sketch phase , but make it cleaner and more polished. I would also recommend taking a piece of paper and filling it with a variety of different facial expressions of your character. Being able to see your character experience a variety of different emotions as well as different poses, stances, costumes, etcetera will make your character more interesting, but just be sure that they still maintain a certain likeness throughout all of your drawings. Consistency is really important when you're doing all of these drawings, as you want your viewer to be able to recognize your character regardless of what hairstyle or facial expression or stance they might have. So, for instance, here is a drawing that I did of my character that I'm creating for this class. I've decided to give this character a mole beneath her eye and around somewhat prominent chin. As I was finishing my second full body drawing of her, I realized that she was missing the mole and the chin. So I went back and added those features to maintain that consistency between the two drawings. And now the two drawings look much more similar to each other, and the character spaces are much more recognizable. Since these drawings are going to be more refined than our previous exploratory sketches, this is also a good time to pull up any reference images. If you want to make sure that your anatomy, costumes or props that you might be using for these drawings is correct. Reference images are also great. If you need inspiration to the morgue drawings of your character, the better, since you'll have more practice and more drawings to choose from in the future, so I won't give you a recommended maximum number. But I would recommend that at absolute minimum, you should draw at least five different drawings of your character in a variety of difference. Dances poses, faces, etcetera. Good luck with your drawings. And now, whenever you're ready, let's continue on to the next video. 10. Assignment: Character Biography: Welcome to your assignment video, where together we'll be making a character biography for your character Before explaining the assignment, I want to answer the question. What is a character? Biography? A character biography is a combination of text and images that all relate to a specific character is character Biographies typically include various images of a single character, along with important information that will help you understand the character better? Here are two examples of two very different character biographies. A biography on the left hand side only includes two images of the character. One nice thing about this particular biography is that there is a lot of text at an extensive history section. So if you're the sort of person that prefers text heavy character biographies, you can use this biography of Storm as a template to draft your own. The character bio on the right is much less text heavy and features more images of our character in various angles and poses. I think this particular character biography would have benefited from maybe just a little bit more background information about character and perhaps also maybe some more interesting facial expressions or various costumes. But in general I feel like this character bio is pretty visually interesting. So as you can see with these two examples, there's a lot of different visual options that you have for grading your old character biography. Let's talk about creating your own character biography and what are some things to keep in mind while doing so When it comes to your drawings, you should have at least three different images of your character. These drawings should be a marriage of variety and consistency. There should be variety in facial expressions, outfits and poses, but there should also be consistency when it comes to your characters, facial features and their body and proportions. Maintaining variety will keep your images interesting and exciting, while maintaining consistency will help ensure that your character will be recognizable. As for the text, you want to include all of the most vital information from your character brief but be assured to do some editing beforehand and leave out the less important details or major plot points. You don't necessarily want to reveal all of your character secrets within the character biography. Leave that for your audience to discover on their own as they're enjoying the story and don't forget that your character bio should reflect your characters. Authenticity, relatability, emotional range and distinctive traits. As for laying out your page, keep in mind that a character bio is a combination of text and images. So take some time to plan out your page layout before you go ahead and create it. It doesn't matter whether or not you orient your page horizontally or vertically. For whether or not you use a grid or how you choose to break up your text and images, just make sure that the visual and textual information is presented clearly and that it's easy to read for this assignment. You want to do at least five drawings of your character, but of course, if you want to do more, that would be even better. From there, you'll select the bust 2 to 4 drawings and include them into your character bio, and to give you another example. Here is the character biography that I created for the character that I developed throughout the creation of this course. So as you can see, there are four different images of the character here. This character biography also includes an edited down version of my character brief, along with some additional information here below the name. Sometimes it can be helpful to include things like, Wait, we're in this case height because it gives you a sense of the physicality of the character . If they were real person, you can also include things like a person's ethnic or national background, and I've also included the person's Zodiac and Myers breaks. This is not necessarily an endorsement of either of those systems, but this gives the viewer a sense of what their personality might be like right off the bat . And now you should be ready to go off and create your own character biography. If you have any other questions, feel free to leave a comment and get in touch because I'm here to help you. Good luck with your character bios. Have fun and I'll see you in the next video. 11. Clothing Design and Costuming: Now it's been some time talking about how you can make more memorable clothing design and costuming choices for your character. It's important to think about your characters clothing choices because clothes can act as a representation of not only how a character of used themselves but how they want to present themselves to the world around them. Smart clothing and costuming choices can give viewers and audiences more insight into a character's personality or inner thoughts. So, for instance, a character that dress is simply and minimally with very little accessories or jewelry would probably exude more of a modest or humble sort of personality. Whereas a person that likes to where lots of clothing and accessories and wear bright colors could be more flamboyant and have more of a desire to stand out. And while your character may have one main outfit or costume that you'd like to present them in, it's also helpful to consider what other clothes they would choose to wear, depending on a given situation. So definitely try to think about what it would wear, maybe to bed. What would they wear toe work or to school? What would they wear on a day What would they wear to a fancy dinner party? What would they were to lounge around the house? And what would their favorite out 50. Keep in mind also, that if you are going to be drawing this character repeatedly, as you often draw characters over and over again in the animation and comics industry, it's a good idea to keep your characters of costume relatively simple. He can also help to do additional research for costumes. So, for example, the character that I'm creating for this course is mostly going to be wearing a school uniform, since most of the time that we see her will be at school. But since I want this character to stand out of it more next to the other people in the background who will also be wearing school uniforms, I decided that I want to style her in a leather jacket. So pulling up images and doing a little bit of research might be helpful, especially since I want her to have a full leather jacket rather than a real one. Since the story takes place in Florida and a real leather jacket would be much too warm for a sub tropical climate. So that's definitely another thing to consider. Is making sure that your costume choices are realistic and makes sense not only for the character but also for the setting. There's plenty more to consider when it comes to costuming and clothing details. This is just a brief taste. What kind of clothes do you like to draw your characters in? Do you prefer to draw them in simple, minimalistic clothes? Or do you like to add tons of flash accessories? Leave a comment, letting you know thanks for watching. And now, whenever you're ready, let's move on to the next video. 12. Closing Thoughts: congratulations. You've made it to the end of the lesson. I really appreciate you taking time to take this lesson with me. And I really hope that you have been able to learn something along the way. Remember that the key to crafting a memorable character is authenticity, relatability, emotional complexity or emotional range and distinctive traits. And the other thing I want to leave you with is the importance of being able to imagine your character is much as possible. Think about their fears, their secrets, their desires. The more you're able, Teoh, think about your character and get an understanding of who they are and answering questions about them. Closer and closer, you'll get to the heart of who they are. So I hope this class was helpful for you. And please don't hesitate to reach out if you have any questions or comments. Thank you so much for taking this lesson with me. I had a great time making it for you. And I hope that you have a great time creating your memorable characters. Take care. Bye bye.