Appeal - A Discussion

WHAT IS APPEAL?

Specialists in appeal are what we call character designers.

“appeal is anything that a person likes to see”. - Frank Thomas, Ollie Johnston

There is something beyond the Quality of the Drawing - Sam Neilson

Early Po designs

Nico Marlet Po designs

Early Pinocchio Designs - Followed by a complete Halt in production until Pinnocchio was made more appealing - in design and character

Redesigned Pinnocchio

"Appeal is a very very hard subject to cover...it's very elusive and hard to quantify"

"Our audience’s sub-conscious will determine whether they like what they see in a fraction of a second."

"Where a live action actor has charisma, a drawn character has appeal."

"Audiences like to see a quality of charm, pleasing design, simplicity, communication, or magnetism. A weak drawing or design lacks appeal. A design that is complicated or hard to read lacks appeal. Clumsy shapes and awkward moves all have low appeal."

"it's the artist's personal charm coming through once the drawing ability is at a level that you can see what's going on in the artist's head.

Many artists who seem creepy and cold as people tend to make creepy and cold drawings. Or they're weird and obsessive and their drawings are weird and obsessive. Giggly girls make really girly drawings, goofy guys make goofy drawings...it's the way that they talk with their pencils."

THE PROBLEM

Mark Kenndy - Not every artist or cartoonist has natural appeal.Some have naturally appealing styles and can take other people's designs or even generic designs and draw them with great appeal.

Mark Kennedy - being an accomplished draftsman isn't the same thing as drawing with an acute sense of appeal.

“The uggly and repulsive may capture your gaze, but there will be neither the building of a character nor identification with the situation that will be needed. There is shock value, but no story strenght.” - Frank and ollie

THE ISSUE AND GOAL

First of all, my purpose here is not to say that one oppinon is wrong and another right or that there are right or wrong answers, rather that this is a real part of character design that all character designers have to face and work out. 


PRINCIPLES OF APPEAL/ TAKING ACTION

here are SOME principles or keys of design which seem to be most universal in appealing designs

Appeal comes from life. You can only illustrate appeal from experiencing life and its emotions. Observing.

Appeal comes from a human connection with the drawings - the most effective drawings are often the ones that the artist themselves enjoyed making - there is a personal charm - a part of the artist or their personality or experience that sometimes comes through - the audience relates to this.

Here is my favorite posting on appeal, by Sam Nielson, a co-worker of mine.  I think he hits some really good points and he has alot of foundation and experience behind him.

http://artsammich.blogspot.com/2007/01/rant-of-week-appeal.html

http://artsammich.blogspot.com/2007/02/appeal-rant-redux.html

"Let me suggest first of all that appeal isn't magical or mystical. It's pretty straightforward, actually. The three ideas that influence appeal are:"

1) Effective use of design principles, 

2) creativity, and 

3) attention to audience and purpose. - What kind of designs appeal to an 11 year old girl?

4) Personality

1st try - lacks appeal

2nd try - much better!

Sam Neilson

SIMPLICITY

Simplicity isn't an excuse to draw poorly - Mark Kennedy

http://sevencamels.blogspot.com/2006/04/appealpart-one.html
http://sevencamels.blogspot.com/2006/04/simplicity-appeal-line-of-action-lot.html

GROUPING 

The three concepts I talk about first - rhythm, variety of shape, and proportion - are three huge, huge secrets to doing great character design

For now, try this out yourself - if you're unhappy with a drawing, look and see what you can "group" together to simplify the pose and give the figure or object more direction or a better gesture.

SIMPLICITY is a big key to appeal. Detail tends to "uglify" a drawing and it loses it's appeal. 

Take away everything that hurts the statement you're trying to make and a drawing will instantly get stronger.

Anyone who's ever designed a character knows how it goes: you start with a drawing that's busy and too complicated. You draw over and over it, refining the design. As you go, you lose what you don't need and simplify until you have something that seems to work (that's how it goes for me anyway).

That's why I love the work of Quentin Blake so much. Every drawing is super efficient. There's only as much there as needed to tell the story he's trying to tell. Nothing extra just to be fancy. And every line contributes to the statement he's making. Every line conforms to the Line Of Action.

Gordi Bernet can draw tons of detail (and disturbing subject matter) and yet always keeps it appealing. How does he do it? I guess he just has an innate sense of design that I find appealing. Also I feel like Jack Davis sometimes has lines in a drawing that don't seem to fufill any function. Bernet seems to always hace a reason for his lines. For example, all of his wrinkles in clothes describe forms by wrapping around the body.

Sometimes Jack's clothes are just exceedingly wrinkled. Bernet only draws a lot of extra wrinkles if the character is an especially untidy person and he wants to show their character. Also Bernet is a master at making fabrics look different from each other - a silky blouse looks different than a stiff wool suit.

A Video on Quentin Blake's Process - http://www.quentinblake.com/about-drawing/how-i-draw

Some articles and sites out there

Design of a TV character for Visual appeal to Pre-schoolers

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2008/12/disney-principles-appeal-1.html

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/search/label/appeal

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2008/12/appealing-character-design-goes-long.html

http://sevencamels.blogspot.com/2006/04/simplicity-appeal-line-of-action-lot.html

http://sevencamels.blogspot.com/2006/04/appealpart-one.html

http://sevencamels.blogspot.com/2006/06/simplicity-and-appealare-they-related.html

http://artsammich.blogspot.com/2007/02/appeal-rant-redux.html

http://artsammich.blogspot.com/2007/01/rant-of-week-appeal.html

Grades

I have posted your current scores on Gradebook so that you can see what you are missing. These are not final.

I have not yet graded your Midterm Hands test.

Also, just a reminder.  I give 3 free absences (Generous, I know:)  but after that each absences WILL affect your grade (see syllabus) - Participation is heavily weighted in this class and even with the blog posts you will miss ALOT if you miss more than 3 days.

A = assignment completed, Full credit
C = assignment incomplete
E = assignment missing (check your label, it may be posted but incorrectly labeled)

BEFORE you panic and email me or come see me about a grade:
1) Check that a missing assignment is correctly labeled with your name (using the tag that I made for you and that appears on the right side of the blog.)
2) Check the assignment instructions and see if you are missing any part of the assignment

THEN you can talk to me about any questions or concerns

Brian Clayton--Assignment #8

Garrett Hamon- Assignment #8

Rebeca Alvarez- Out of Class Assignment #8

*sorry these are an hour late, I did not notice the time because I was distracted! 

Jessica Staley - Out of Class Assignment #8

Head Shape Redraws

Kyle Mills Midterm hands

Kyle Mills face draw overs

Natalie Hansen—Face Drawovers

Brian Clayton--Out of Class Assignment #8

Head Breakdown

Designing with a Purpose - Mark Kennedy

This is a great post by Mark Kennedy on his personal process for character design. 

CONFESSIONS OF A LAZY CHARACTER DESIGNER – Mark Kennedy 

Character Design is an art and a discipline and I totally admire people who are good at it. So I am not writing this post to share all my wonderful knowledge or anything, but heck, I'll do my best to share what I've learned from my limited experience in this arena 
Here are the criteria I try to meet when doing designs:

1. It should be something I understand in three dimensions and that I can draw from any angle. It should look appealing from every angle.
2. The design should lend itself to expressive expressions and poses. Those expressions and poses should be appealing as well.
3. It should look as original as possible; not like something you've seen before.
             But as far as that last one goes - everyone has a different idea of that. Obviously my designs aren't exactly ground-breaking or shockingly fresh and original. But I do try very hard to make sure I'm not repeating something I've seen before. 
5. The character design should describe the personality of the character.


I'm a big believer in the idea that when you look at a design, you should get an immediate sense of what that character's personality is. It's just like in live-action: directors cast actors who are going to bring a physical presence to the role and look like what the audience expects the character to look like. 

There is a big difference between the types of actors cast as leading men and those who are "character actors" who tend to be cast in the supporting type of roles over and over. 

If the designs of your characters don't work well in telling the audience what type of personality they are then you have to do extra work in informing the audience what they are like. The best characters are ones in which the design, voice acting and animation are all unified and work together in concert to create a great character. The sooner the audience can hook into exactly what type of character they're dealing with, the quicker they can engage with the story and focus on the events that are unfolding instead of trying to decipher what type of character they're seeing.

Ethan Wilkins Hands Midterm

Hands Out of Class #6 Natalie Fielding

some rough hands.

Ginger Dall Out of Class 8

Rachel Sackett hands midterm

Natalie Fielding Hands

These are the hands I'm using for the exam/midterm.

Stacey Sleight - Head Shapes

Rebeca Alvarez- Midterm hands

Sorry! I thought I had posted these a long time ago