We all know and love original characters, those unique and fascinating characters that we can't help but fall in love with. But where do they come from? How are they created?
In this special interview, we sit down with a popular original character creator Julian to find out the secrets behind her amazing characters. From their inspirations to their secrets, this is an interview you won't want to miss!
What got you started with creating characters and fan art?
Consuming literature and media! I feel like I first started creating fan art around the time I started reading children's series like Warrior Cats and watching shows like the original Teen Titans. I fell in love with the characters and wanted to see more of them, so I began drawing them in notebooks. I started creating characters when I began to form my own stories in my head, around late elementary school.
What inspires most of your original characters?
I feel like most of my characters were inspired by a single trait I happened to come across randomly throughout my day, either through direct observation or through the consumption of media. Maybe I heard an interesting voice on the street, or saw a cool hairstyle in the classroom, or read about a person or event in a book; any one of these instances could inspire a new character.
Would love to hear more about the favorite character you designed and what you think made it so good.
I think one of my favorite original designs would be for a character I have called Sharktooth. She's supposed to be this greasy, weasel-like spaceship mechanic of sorts, and so I gave her oily hair tied up in an orange bandana, a cropped tank top, lanky frame, and big, baggy cargo pants, all coated in a thin layer of grime to maximize her greasiness. I love her half-closed eyes and permanent smirk with a crooked tooth—really adds to her ratty-ness as well.
How did you get started as an artist? You seem to have a very specific style of art that you share frequently. Would love to hear more about that!
I got started by scribbling around in kindergarten! My style as I know it now didn't develop fully until just last year even though I've been drawing since I was a child, which is truly a testament to how fluid art styles are. I guess throughout all that time I was really trying to push certain qualities of my colors and lines and I kind of hated my style until recently. I'm still working on it!
What advice do you have for beginner artists who are looking to do character art?
In the beginning, I was utterly unconcerned with technique. After all, I started drawing character art as fan art of book and TV characters, so I was far more concerned with satisfying the urge to draw the Powerpuff Girls 10 times in a row... All this is to say that passion is important! I enjoyed what I was drawing before I enjoyed how I was drawing, and improved only because I wanted to do the characters justice.
What do you think is the difference between an average character design and a mind-blowing one?
Every mind-blowing character design I've seen has had an incredible sense of form and personality. For form, that is to say, when you look at the design, you can feel the roundedness of the face, the weight of the feet, etc., etc. For personality, that is to say, that you can feel who this character is; I remember seeing Knight Zhang's design of a hot-pink cyborg roller derby girl who used a busted-up stop sign as a weapon, and it was the coolest thing I had ever seen. I mean, you could just tell this character had a fireball of a personality.
What advice do you have for people who are looking to come up with their own characters?
I would say: what is a mood, a message, a feeling you want to convey? It doesn't have to be grand or anything; my first characters were born out of a desire to recreate some awesome fight scene or edgy monologue I had seen in anime. I wanted to make characters that would capture or convey that same sense of awesomeness or edginess. Obviously, the character would be rather rudimentary at this stage, but I would then build up more complex stories and personalities from there.
You've built a sizable audience through your art and character design and have also built a business from selling things on Etsy to doing commissions. What was the process of building your online audience and businesses like?
I really didn't originally intend for my audience to grow this large. I started posting my art online years ago because I wanted to share memes and fan art with my school friends. It wasn't until just 2 years ago that I experienced significant social media growth, mostly because I made some art friends during a summer camp and connected with them online. This alone got me in touch with a huge network of artists like me! I also did some art challenges here and there, made fan art that got popular... early last year I opened the online shops because I thought I finally had an audience for my art.
Cronchybaguette
Julian, aka Cronchybaguette, is currently a caracter designer at Netflix and Annapurna Interactive. From San Jose, CA pursuing a career in character design and/or visual development. She loves ceviche and cable car rides!
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