Creating Characters:

Dr.Jekyll and Mt.Hyde

In this blog I will be writing about the creation of Characters and how we determined their design. As I am studying the book of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde I will have to know many aspects of this character to design my own interpretation. Therefore there are certain elements that I need to know about my character to develop its appearance like; background story, status, characteristics, personality, state of mind and attitudes. These are the elements I will need to research and state to continue the development in my character and its design. To understand the grasp of how design work and the understanding of a characters looks/personalities goes into it we looked at a video called 'Clevver Movies' which showed a character from the 'Harry Potter' films explaining the development of his character over the seven films.

The short clip from the link above was showing the actor Jason Issacs who  plays the character 'Lucius Malfoy' which through the clip he explains the role of his character but also how he has changed over time through the novel through experiences. His character always wanted to be powerful but is undermined by 'Lord Voldamort' and his great powers. He wishes to portray himself as great and powerful as he works beside the great lord but small elements of cowardliness shows the audience that he is scared and afraid. This small clip can help me as I need to understand how the story line and plot will reflect on my characters appearance as 'Lucius Malfoy' first is seen as a clean well dressed character compared to the end of the novel when he looks tired, messy and has grown a beard representing to the audience that he has gone through traumatic times.

Does Design Matter?:

In this video 'Does Design Matter' we look at something a bit different from the previous video but also similar. We are informed in this video that relations between stereotypes is an aspect that can block a lot of designers thoughts when creating a new character. The man states when he is teaching the younger/next generation this ideas of stereotypes is something that has to be ignored as otherwise a lot of female gaming characters can be built in a very sexual way e.g. big chests, small weights and revealing outfits. Therefore as any kind of designer the message is to think past what has already been done, adapt it and make it better. I found that when designing that it is OK to take inspiration from others and their work but as long as you make the design your own. Another thought gathered from this is that the audience needs to connect with the characters that you create and when these stereotypes have been over done many times this can create insecurities for young generation therefore the aim is to connect with whatever target audience on an emotional level in a positive way, this is considered a primary goal.

Therefore the design process for anything or any aspect of planning is always very important if you want it to achieve as 'failing to plan, is planning to fail'. The research and background evaluation into the character you wish to design is vital as one tiny detail could help you expand on a final design. As I am planning my own character I will take every aspect from this piece of writing and show through my work my development of work that I wish to achieve in my character. The key aspect for this unit is 'continuity' making sure that we can repeat the same designs and repeat them. This aspect will be a great challenge in achieving my work and so the design process is very important as they will act as my instructions in repeating the same look for my final character. To continue this blog I will be researching further into the background of my character to fully understand my elements that I can develop further into. Continuity is very important in Tv and Film as any mistake can be seen if not done correctly and this skill is extremely important for me to learn as if I was working within this industry I would HAVE to make sure the costume and make-up was exactly the same. To show bad mistake that have happened I watch ' Biggest Movie Mistakes' which is a prime example of why everything has to be perfect to make a TV series or Film as this make it realistic to the audience. To finish the blog to link to the theme of continuity I practiced a piece of my own work by repeating the same make-up look on my own face and then repeating it to see how easy it is to achieve.

 Attempt One:
In my first attempt I used a pink Dior lipstick and lined my lips and then patted on with my finger a light pink glitter. As this was quite a simple lip I new it would be quite easy to re-create. To practice the continuity practice I then took of the lipstick and then repeated the look. When I repeated the look it does look pretty much the same but while comparing the two images I did slightly over line the lips making it not match. Therefore I have learnt that you need to take your time and always have a reference image in front of me to help keep them the same.