Digital Reflection 13 - Character development continued

The next stage was to further refine the details of the character. I applied different hair and skin colours to try and match her personality and to give the impression of an otherworldly magical race. I was leaning towards making a dark elf variant as I thought it would match her demeanour and clothing, but I also experimented with lighter and warmer tones. Although I discovered some interesting options, the warm tones would have clashed with the cooler tones that I envisioned for her clothing and weapons, and some of them looked too human. Therefore, I tried making a version of her skin and hair using cooler tones, but changing the eye colour to a striking magical orange hue. I liked this version the best as the orange eyes stood out from the cold dark tones of the hair and face, and she resembled a classic high fantasy dark elf form popular culture, so she would be recognisable as a specific race.
I used reference from Dishonored character designs for painting style. I was looking at the way the artist used created angular highlights to exaggerate the sharp shape language and to highlight the planes of the face.

Dishonored reference boards

Painting stages

Adding detail to the face

 Adding highlights to the hair

Final skin and hair colours

Next I developed the details even further, pulling together some miniature reference boards. I used images from both fantasy and western genres, as well as victorian fashion as many elements of the Wild West derived from Victorian England. Creating this detail sheet proved crucial to the project as it would allow a 3D artist in industry to identify the exact shapes and textures of an object.

The colours of the dress were experimented on, using similar techniques to the face and hair colour. I used the selective colour tool in Photoshop to alter the different tones much more precisely than I would be able to with a gradient map. I mostly experimented with different tones of blue and purple as this is what we discussed as a group. I also altered the saturation levels and the pop of colour that I would use. The final result was a fairly unsaturated purple outfit with pops of white and orange. The orange matched the eye colour, and enhanced the appearance of magic within the character.

Final colours