Collaboration
I was able to collaborate with my classmate Joe. He is also doing a Animatic for his project and I offered to help him with character and prop designs for his story that takes place in Mexico. I am also acting as a sort of cultural advisor to help him make sure the visuals introduced are accurate. Its really fun and rewarding helping someone depict my culture and home country in a correct manner. At the same time while designing, we also bounce ideas off each other for our own projects and it really helped with the flow of creativity. I designed for him three nuns with different shape languages based on some characters he made for his story. I also created character designs for a Organillero with two different shape languages
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On the right is the Nuns character design. Joe gave me the designs of his three kids characters and asked me to create Nuns based on their shape language. I looked up a number of references for my nuns designs. Specifically nuns from Mexico and how they dress. Joe requested that I make the nuns older. I made one Nun bigger with a rounder face, a shorter one and a tall elongated Nun. I also had some inspiration from looking at the Nun characters from the stopmotion film "Wendell and Wild" I looked at the character rigs and the concept arts to see how they made the characters
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The Nuns
The taller version has a heavier top, not as heavy as a character like Mr. Bobinsky but still a elongated type with a long rectangular face. Could make a nice contrast to the other shorter character which is lovely to see in a character line up. It was really fun to discuss with Joe about ideas for the characters and it was a delight to draw these.
Organilleros
Organilleros are people in Mexico who play the Harmonipan (A type of barrel organ). They wear a uniform and take donations as they play. They are really common to see them all over Mexico City, so they are a part of the typical Mexico City soundscape. Its very nostalgic to hear their instrument. Joe suggested a design with a tall heavy top shape much like Gru from "Despicable Me" and Mr. Bobinsky from "Coraline". We spoke and I thought that a organillero shape is more short and stocky because they need to hold up the Harmonipan. So I took reference of characters like Carl Fredrickson from "Up" and Manny Calavera from the video game "Grim Fandago". I made two versions of the character, a short stocky one and a taller heavy top. I decided for the stocky character to make him a squarish type, so I gave him a square head. The sort of image I was aiming for was something that resembled my great uncle who has a shape like this and a moustache. I made a alternative face with and without the facial hair.
Photo support
To further support Joe with the visuals of his Animatic. I shared with him a folder of pictures that I took of Mexico when I visited my family in the past. There is a lot of photos of just the surroundings of Mexico City with vendors and food stalls that make up the urban environment that Joe wants to emulate in his work. I explained to him what the stalls are and their place in Mexican culture so that he can have a deeper understanding of where they might appear geographically in the setting of his story.