I did some digital inking over my red-pencil model sheet. Unfortunately I was in a rush to get to the pesky day job, so I’ll probably end up re-doing most of this. Gotta remember to stay loose when inking!

I’m creating a model sheet for Mary Rae and Kerkel, in anticipation of the next batch of strips (Coming Soonish™). I’ve started with the all-important height comparison. Looking back at the first 11 strips, I realize I did something sort of clever without even trying: never once did I draw them explicitly standing on the same plane. In other words, even when Kerkel seemed a little too tall, their feet were out of frame, so you couldn’t prove in a court of law that anybody was out of proportion.

These model sheets will be mostly about achieving consistency, rather than a complete overhaul of the characters. However, I’ve decided to make a slight modification to Mary Rae’s hair; that pulled-back look was a pain to draw in the comic strip, let alone animation. Now I can indicate her hair in just a few strokes.

I went out and bought some plasticine modeling clay, to help me design characters that work in 3 dimensions. This Kerkel head is a little rough around the edges, but it’s enough to assist me in drawing him from any angle.

I couldn’t resist sketching 1950s Groucho as I died laughing at these outtakes from “You Bet Your Life” on YouTube.

Well golly, this is still in a sloppy state, in so many ways, but I really need to move on to my next bit of practice (or maybe the 11-second contest if the April sound file appeals to me). I think I was fairly happy with the movement early on, but for me the hard part was keeping Mary looking consistent from frame to frame. I didn’t design her for animation, and if I really wanted to use her, I should have drawn a model sheet in advance, and really nailed down how she’s supposed to look from different angles.

Here’s an example of a model sheet, of that fish-lady from the Little Mermaid:

Obviously, as I get better at drawing, and better at planning, I’ll be better at animating relatively complicated characters like Mary Rae, but whatever I do next will definitely be more along the lines of Elmer Fudd, as I mentioned before.