College of New Caledonia/Drawing For Story
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Lecture 4

Elements in Developing a Believable Character

Step 1: Sign in to LinkedIn Learning

Sign in to LinkedIn Learning through the CNC hub using your CNC email address.

Open LinkedIn Learning

Step 2: Watch as a Class — Chapters 2 & 3

Chapter 2

Capturing the Heart and Soul of a Character

  • Using the right tools
  • Relying on archetypes
Chapter 3

Character Construction

  • Form
  • Expression
  • Colour
  • And more

Homework

Will Wright: High-Fidelity vs. Low-Fidelity Game Visuals

Watch on YouTube

About the Speaker

Will Wright has become one of the most successful designers of interactive entertainment in the world. He began working on what would become SimCity—The City Simulator in 1985. Using a complex technique, he found a way to bring realistic simulations to desktop PCs. Previously, simulations of this sort were only available to the military, scientists and academicians. However, using an easy-to-use graphic interface, the world of simulations opened up to consumers.

Homework / In-Class Exercise: Part 3 — Character Detective

Choose one character from a game, movie, animation, comic, or other visual story. It can be a character you really like, or simply one that you think is visually interesting.

Bring the character to class and answer these questions:

  1. 1

    Who are they?

    What do you understand about this character just by looking at them?

  2. 2

    Form

    What do their shape, proportions, size, clothing, or silhouette tell you?

  3. 3

    Expression

    What do their face, body language, or pose communicate?

  4. 4

    Colour

    How is colour being used? What does the colour palette make you think or feel?

  5. 5

    Archetype

    Does the character remind you of a familiar character type or archetype? What clues create that connection?

  6. 6

    High or low fidelity?

    Does the character rely on lots of visual detail, or can you understand them with relatively simple shapes and information?

  7. 7

    What makes them believable?

    Choose one visual decision that you think does the most to make this character feel like a real person or believable character.

Bring to Class

  • 1 image of your character
  • Your answers to the questions above
  • Be prepared to spend 1–2 minutes showing the character to the class and explaining your most interesting observation

The goal isn't to decide whether the character is “good” or “bad.” We're looking at the visual decisions the designer made and how those decisions help us understand the character.