Oakley
Cryptic is a world where humans are bonded to demons. Created this summer, like most of my favorites, Oakley was developed from a little sketch that I did. This sketch then inspired me to give him an outfit and a name! He has gone through some significant changes in design. From originally wearing a black punk rock jacket to now wearing a pumpkin orange and white hoodie.
Oakley Sketches
Oakley
Argus
Also part of the world of Cryptic, Argus is bonded to a demon whereas Oakley was born part demon. The creation of Argus took/is taking a long time. My first ever thought about Argus was, “what if I made character with an eyeball instead of a mouth?” I started doodling eyes… a lot as well around this time. My first ever drawing of him was a white board sketch which you can see down below. I then went on to design his colors and give him a name! He is named after Argus, the 100-eyed giant in Greek mythology.
Argus Sketches
Kambo Oramo
An immigrant from Central Africa, Kambo moved to New York when she was very young and discovered her illusion powers when she became a teenager. I have been working on Kambo for about a year. Her design is partly inspired by reading the book “A Long Walk to Water”. Her design came very easily to me: messy hair tied back and a simple colored t-shirt. My understanding is that there is an African girls’ name, Kambo, which means “must work for everything”.
Kambo Sketches
Greyson
Greyson is my take on a common story trope. In many stories, the main character lives in a world where everyone has magical abilities. Often this main character is a late bloomer who worries they have no power but then turns out to have the most powerful magical abilities. For Greyson, however, I decided to twist fate. He does not have any magical abilities whatsoever ever and due to bullying he falls towards a path of villainy, revenge and evil.
Greyson Sketches
Kite
For most of my life I’ve drawn dragons. So it makes sense for me to put in at least one of my dragon characters in here. Meet Kite, a protective mountain dragon guard. I (extremely) loosely based her design on the kite, a bird of prey. I grew up fascinated by the animals around me, and where I lived in San Francisco just happed to have these birds.
I consider my design for dragons fairly basic. With a long snake like body, two pairs of legs, horns on the head, and wings that connect at the shoulders.
Studies
Color Palettes
Whenever I suffer from art block, I make a series of characters inspired by color palettes.
Shape Language
Shape language is a technique that character designers use to express a character's personality. When designing a character there are three main shapes to incorporate: circle, square and triangle. Circles are used for main characters. They symbolize trust and kindness. Squares are used for secondary characters. They symbolize stubbornness. Finally, triangles are used for antagonists, and are symbols of intelligence and deceit.
Characters from Objects
A design challenge I did was to create characters from objects. Above, you can see characters based on a water bottle, a lamp, a roll of tape, and an air purifier. The easiest design was probably the lamp, since it already had a human shape. But my favorite is the roll of tape, with its cartoonish face floating off its body.
Backgrounds
To grow as illustrator, I wanted to practice drawing backgrounds, which is something I have always struggled with. This led to the mostly black and white drawing you see here. I unintentionally invoked Halloween in July.