ultimate book of character design/cartoon characters

#1

Hi,

has anyone any suggestions of a really good book for researching character design.

if i wasnt really skint id maybe get a few books, disney, looney toons and maybe some more random alternative stuff.

being as i am very poor i was wandering if anyone had any suggestions for some kind of ultimate encyclopedia or just any suggestions of good books in general of this nature.

Thanks

#2

Take a look at this art…

His name is Bobby Chiu and I guess you will drool :drool: a couple of days looking at his great skills…

[thread=210734]Click me![/thread]

Hope I helped?

#3

thanks for that,

his work is cool, but a bit illustrative for what i want.

im planning on making a super cartoony squashy bouncy stretchy rigged 3d character.

ive designed and made characters before. but i wanna research this one well first.

i was just wandering if there was some kind of character design bible. probably not.

#4

Sounds to me like what you’re looking for is The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation by Frank Thoimas and Ollie Johnston. If there’s a bible on classic, cel-based animation, this is it. Johntson and Thomas were two of Disney’s famous Nine Old Men, responsible for most of the Disney classic films. The book is not cheap, and it’s not small - it is, in fact, the biggest tome you’ll find on the subject. It thoroughly covers character design, acting for animation, suwash and stretch, timing, backgrouds, the works. It’s solid.

here’s the link to Amazon.com

Good luck!

-mike

#5

yeah… The Illusion of Life is great…

Also, I just picked up the Pixar MOMA book last month…

http://momastore.org/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10001&storeId=10001&productId=34204&cid=ILC-MoMA_Fall_2005_Exhibitions&att=Pixar

It’s great and it’s only $30. The first 75 pages is all character design stuff. Very VERY inspiring. The last hundred pages covers storyboards, colorscripts and background/environment art. All in all one of the best books I own. It is more of a picture book rather than a… “this is how you design a cool character” book though.

#6

Thanks, that does look good.

i like your latest animation by the way.

#7

Not a character reference book, but a website of a good character designer who is a friend of mine:

http://www.characterdesigns.com/

Great reference images on this site! And the featured artists are Disney people, I believe.

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rebeccak

#8

oh… yeah… websites…

two of my favorites:

www.eddiepittman.com
www.joesandstrom.com

i like your latest animation by the way.

Thanks :thumbsup:

#9

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