Our Character Design artist, Ryan, has been hard at work and has produced the following initial sketches for several more characters found in our story. Below each is laid out, with a small description of the character, and the role they play in the film without giving too much away of course.
Michael is one of the three children who are in the first scene of the film, which opens to these children climbing around their grandmother, asking to be told a story.
This sketch will obviously be softened, to show his young age, and have color added in later on before being sent off to the sculptors for their part of the job.
Grandma is also in the opening scene of the film, enjoying time with her grandchildren.
The Servant may not seem like an important character in the film, since obviously he is hired help found in the castle. But because he is seen in several scenes throughout the film, and interacts with our main characters in those scenes, we wanted to make sure to give him a proper design from start to finish. The initial sketch here reminds one of turn of the century middle aged servants found in Austria and the surrounding region, where his mustache was in fashion at the time.
Julia is one of the two main characters in our film, fairly obvious since her name is in the title after all. Without giving too much away, she becomes somewhat of a damsel in distress at certain points, while being the hero in others. We are modeling her after the actress that has agreed to play the character's voice in the film, but also wanted her to have a look all her own. Large eyes, full lips and a somewhat small nose give her soft yet well defined feminine qualities.
Cat is the final character we are showing today, and while she will be the smallest of our cast of characters, I think her personality will stand above many of the others. Cat is a small talking mouse that has become friends with Julia, and ends up basically going everywhere with her. She may be small, but she is very opinionated to say the least. She will definately be a fun character for the animators to work with when she is in her final model form.
In the coming weeks we will be unveiling more initial character design sketches, as well as the designs as they progress towards their finished and finalized look. If you would like to see more of Ryan Huseman's work, please check out his site here
http://ryanhuseman.com/home.html .
Also coming sometime in the next couple of days, one of our sculptors will be showing how a clay oven is made, as well as explaining why they are essential to have around in a production like this.
