Author: Micey

J. Shen or "Micey" is a sophomore at Umich. She loves character design and telling stories and dabbles in making her own comics. Sketchbook Smashing is an attempt to chronicle her process in designing characters. From first concepts, hairstyle and outfit changes, or even complete shifts in design. She also hopes to map out how her own art style changes throughout the year. Her website is https://wallmouseart.weebly.com Her art Tumblr is https://wallmouse.tumblr.com

Nagosta Outfit Stuff

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This is Nagosta Vo. They are an employee at this weird house covered in art. You can often find them playing video games in the vents and being a general menace to the rest of the employees.

I put their hair up, tucked their sweater in, and gave them knee pads for better mobility and vent-crawling.They have albinism and dye their hair, and I like my decision to show their roots. I used bright green as an accent color to signal their loud personality and love for video games.

The bottom picture was completed first. As you can see from the first image, I changed their eye shape and hairstyle when coming up with the outfit. It’s easier to draw expressions that way.

Character Mock-ups

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(Left to Right: Simon, Hima, Lily, Yim, Enola)

These are some inked and colored concepts of my characters. I already want to change their designs. Maybe it’s something about seeing them presented as if their designs are finalized that is activating the art critic part of me. Simon’s coat could be more realistic, Hima’s pink could be a darker read, Lily’s coat could be blue, Yim could look more eldritch, and Enola could use a hoodie with sleeves. I guess that means more time sketching before the actual character sheets. A shame, but it’s good that I won’t be spending a ton of time on designs I personally feel need improvement.

Guildies: The Time Vivian got Possessed

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What if Viv, from a previous post, got possessed by the fae-dragon she made a pact with? I gave her a forehead eye because it fits a dream and abstract-concept-based character like her. So would her new, messy hairstyle. I also included concepts for the main fae-dragon body in the upper right corner. I like the concept of only the middle forehead eye having a pupil, and that the new Vivian doesn’t use her old eyes. Even though she keeps old Vivian’s professional wardrobe. I added a possible disguise for her in the bottom left corner. I have no clue how the guild would react to this. Probably badly.

Phen Lemege

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This is Phen Lemege. She’s an office drone of the Mercenaries Guild’s bureaucracy. She works in the ever-backlogged dimensional travel department. There’s a 5-year waitlist!

She’s supposed to have an attractive secretary look. She has a background in Hell, like a DnD tiefling. She’s dating Tove, who wass a previous subject of Sketchbook Smashing. She has cherry-red skin, and rams horns and I don’t know if she should have a tail. I keep forgetting to add it. I’m not sure about her personality. I’m thinking since most of her clothes are black and white, maybe she could have a black-and-white morality.

Simon Update

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Here’s a Simon update! He’s the main character of my story, Guildies. He’s a member of the Mercenaries Guild Conglomerate, and he’s sent to watch this interesting house in Sutton, Michigan. I wanted to do more full-body posing, and work on his collar. I like how I did the collar as well as the rips on his clothes. I used zig-zags instead of something more complicated for his coat, and I think that worked well. I also modified his eye shape to make it easer to draw.