Sarah Clarity Studios

Tips for character design that emphasize originality and personality, supported by visual examples from your sketchbooks or visual library.

So, the question usually comes: how do we design unique characters?

No one wants to be a copycat. Everyone wants to be original. But come a few tries, and you’ll get someone who will say to you, “hey, that reminds me of that character from A Franchise!”

No one wants to be told their first idea looks like so-and-so from A Franchise. Right?

Well, we have our influences, but we also have our real art and media influences. Whether we admit it or not, our styles can sometimes absorb everything, things we wanted to and things we weren’t aware of.

If you are not working in a company, but just on your own, I’d say, design for completion first. Don’t do an overhaul of what you have just because your friends swear your character looks like a cross between two very well-known TV series, or something similar, for the sake of your own happiness.

If you are working in a company, well then, for goodness sake, please change your design! Let your team or managers know. Let your director know! Please and thank you from all of them who don’t have your knowledge at this time. Please do not get involved in any awkward or painful legal complications, for the sake of your own sanity.

When we have an obsession over originality, sometimes we forget that the thing that distinguishes characters, even lookalike characters, is personality.

We identify Miyazaki’s female characters as brave and gutsy leads, right? Well, if you have the same looking character in a different anime, as we all know that anime styles are predictable and mass-marketably repeatable, but they have a different personality, your viewers and fans will forgive you. Because everyone knows that there are only so many hairstyles and hair colors available for this genre.

Before you do an overhaul of character design, folks, check the personality of your character first. Are they already different than the other characters that are in other franchises? If so, then you are okay.

If it is like, exactly the same looking, and your character doesn’t say much (or anything at all) in the media that you are creating, then maybe consider changing up the jewelry or the fabric type of the clothing along with colors, so people don’t point fingers at you for unoriginality.

An artist I met recently suggested to me that if I ever wanted to learn what style my painting or drawing was like, that I take a picture through Google Lens and the AI in it will say, “Your artwork is like the art of so-and-so famous artist of such-and-such a time period.”

In the light of all of the AI controversy that is happening, it is always healthy to use AI in healthy ways for you, so you can be served by technology instead of feeling or literally being abused by it.

If no one on your team is aware of any copyright infringement, but you’re still feeling shaky about sending out your design, put it through something like Google Lens and see what the AI models tell you. It is a good double-checking method. And if it comes up with 5 other sources of the same looking character, you can decide how to make yours look different.

Remember, tropes exist for a reason, and if you like the idea of riffing off of a trope or echoing it in a new way, then go ahead. Be brave and submit! Publish!

We all have visual libraries for inspiration, and if you want to check your creation through the filter of your collective visual libraries, try that when you have the time and aren’t being rushed to finish. If everyone has the same types of references, your styles will converge over time, and if you’re not careful, you might end up being too close to your references. Just be sure to add in a unique element or two that is outside of your original visual libraries to stay safe. Hence, the beauty of not designing something too 1-to-1; those of you who draw by imagination have the advantage here, provided no one can hold up a fanart of a popular character and point out the 1-to-1 similarities!

Usually changing the size of the eyes or the nose or the facial features along with the hair and the eyebrows and the size of the ears will be enough. You can change skin tones if you have a new character. Do they look beautiful with dark skin? Then keep it that way. Olive complexion perfect? Same idea. We have quite a bit of freedom these days in how we depict our characters, and we always have ideas of an alternate universe in our back pockets. Just changing the skin tone of your character may be all you need this time.

Draw as much as you can. Challenge yourself to iterate beyond rote. Once you do it for a job and not just for you, everything can turn rote like no one’s business. Try to turn the boredom off and turn your passion up – even just a smidge. And if it seems like you are stuck with your references or with your seemingly limited visual library, remember, sometimes the only solution left is to draw. Please do. You will be smiling in no time.

Yours,

Sarah