Character Design

I’m still experimenting with my character design, I’m yet to have reached a design that I’m fully happy with but I know that if I keep at it I will develop an idea which I feel fits my animation and the visual ideas that I have for it.

Character traits that I’m playing with throughout and that I won’t be changing is the hair. The hair is going to be very much a signature trait for my young heroine. The bun on the one side is a popular hairstyle for young Japanese girls which I’ve discovered through my research and so I felt for her age range especially that this fitted well. Now to consider the environment she’s living in and taking in the fact that she is alone in this world, I wanted one side of the hair to have fallen down. To signify the fact that she is unable to put it back up due to lack of resources (No shops) and no parents/guardians to help her do it (illustrates her age).  But why does she not take both sides down? Because if she was to do that then she is choosing to forget how her life used to be, or perhaps the person that helped her with her hair in the first place. For a childs mind, her hair being up represents some kind of safety, like a warm memory from the past.