Mermaids
Example of Iain McCaig's work
The main character is the most important part of our story, so my group and I decided to work together on this design. My part in this collaboration for the character was to research mermaids and their features as a key to develop distinctive character. I looked into books, images and videos about the mermaids, such us The Little Mermaid animation by Disney, The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen and Visual Story Telling By Ian McCaig. Inspired by these sources, I developed few mood boards showing the ideas for the design of the mermaids.
My first mood board was inspired by a quote from a book The Little mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen. The quote described the mermaid as 'the youngest was the prettiest of them all; her skin was as clear and delicate as a rose-leaf, and her eyes as blue as the deepest sea; but, like all the others, she had no feet, and her body ended in a fish's tail'. Based on this description, I pick reference images such as deep blue eyes to for a sea blue eyes, rose to pick a pale, delicate skin colour and few images with mermaid's tail. I used colour picker in a photoshop to create a triadic colour palette consisting of blue, green and pink colours from these images. There was no records of the hair colour in the original story. I decided to choose brown to contrast with blue eyes.
Inspired by the artist Ian McCaig I used grey markers to create a silhouette of the mermaid and draw various scales and fish fins on the sides of the tail and the head. Experimenting has led me to develop three different silhouettes determined by shapes, such as circle, square and triangle to express whether the character is cute, cool or evil.
I used the three silhouettes to develop three different characters. The first silhouette with angular features is a kind, caring mermaid, which is the protagonist. The second with square fish fins on the head stands for a cool singing mermaid, one of the sisters. The last silhouette features spiky tail with fish fins around the waist and head. It represents the evil sister who will hand the knife to the protagonist in our story.
I created the mood board for two sisters with a contrasting colour palette. They are different from the main character to show the contrast in personality between them and the little mermaid. In the original story, the little mermaid was fascinated by human culture and saved the prince from drowning. Her sisters were the complete opposite. They found it fun to lure people into the water with their singing and drown them. They may seem to be evil. However, their song was about the joy and fun the swimming in the water brings them. They didn't mean to drown people. They wanted to show them how fun it is to swim. For this exact reason, I decided to give them a colour palette consisting of cool purple and warm yellow. I didn't want to picture them as dark heartless creatures. Instead, I wanted to show them as different from the main character but still helpful in the end. As they are the last hope for the little mermaid.
I've done a few sketches, I shared my ideas with the group, and they approved the designs. I started working on a final version in photoshop as it is easier to make changes to characters. As a part of working as a group, I sent the design to Eleni, who designed the robe, hair ornaments and makeup to fit into the old Japanese style. I added her ideas to my drawing and started colouring it when we decided to change her tail. We wanted the main character to be different from other mermaids. Following the Japanese culture theme, we came up with the idea of a Koi fishtail. My colleague from the group Eleni came up with the design, which I applied to the final design of the mermaid. As a group, we decided to follow the same pattern for all the characters, but in our style.
The last part of the main character design was to create a human form, which she will have after her transformation. Based on the mermaid design, I drew a pleated skirt to refer to her wavy tail. I kept the same to she had as a mermaid and added flat shoes in red colour to match her hair ornament. It was necessary to keep this similarities between her human and mermaid form to make the character recognizable even after the transformation.
I am happy with how the main character turned out. Although it is different from my original idea, I like the changes we made to it. The group work helped me to develop the character further and push the details of the design to create a very original character.
In the original story and Disney adaptation, the mermaid has six sisters. However, because our story will mainly focus on the main character, we wanted to save time on designing all six of them. Instead, we decided two will be enough to mention them in the story. If we need to show more than that, we could show them as silhouettes in the water.
I followed the same pattern of the main character wearing a robe and hair ornament. The only changes I made to these were alternate the shape of the ornaments to fit into the distinctive shape of the tail.
I am happy with how all of the three mermaids turned out. The mermaids look different but wear the same clothes and ornaments. It suggests that there is a specific culture of fashion under the water. I think these small details fulfilled the designs and the purpose of showing the cultural differences between land and ocean in our story.
In the Disney adaptation, the little mermaid had a friend, a tropical fish called Flounder. My group decided it would make sense if we gave our mermaid a friend to determine her actions. For example, it would make more sense if she had a reason to go back into the water after saving the prince, such as a friend calling her to go back.
At first, I thought a Koi fish friend was a good idea as it could relate to Japanese culture. However, I didn't want to repeat the same pattern of a Koi fish in the mermaid and fish companion design, so I tried to find another type of fish that appears in Japanese culture as an important figure.
I found out that goldfish symbolise fortune and good luck and are highly prized pets in Japan. Combined with a monochromatic yellow colour palette, it could represent the good influence of a fish companion on the mermaid as it would help her make the good choices to help her.
I created a mood board containing pictures of various goldfish and a colour palette. I liked the cartoony fish from my mood board. It looked very innocent and trustworthy, which was determined by its round shape. I created a few sketches of a round fish with big pupils to make it look cute. However, when I asked my group what they thought about it. They said to make the pupils a bit smaller as it looked creepy. I intended to make the fish look cute and friendly, so I changed the pupils.
I am happy with the shape of its head but not the body. I wanted to make the fish very round to make it look friendly, but at the same time, I wanted to keep its resemblance to a real goldfish. My group was happy with the design, so I decided to keep it this way.
Fish Companion
The Prince
In the original story of Hans Christian Andersen, the prince was treating the little mermaid like a pet and loved her 'as he would love a little child'. Because in the original story mermaid's lover was a prince, I decided to show what he would look like in modern days. In the 21st century, there are fewer people with the title of Royal family and the influential hierarchy in our society is mostly rich people. The prince in our story will be a rich guy living in Tokyo in Japan who happens to own an expensive ship and loves sailing, which will lead him to almost being drowned by mermaids.
I began by putting together a mood board containing inspiration for elements of price's wardrobe, face features and hairstyle. The style of his clothing was important to show his wealth, but also the fact that land it's a more modern place than the bottom of the ocean in our story.
The key element of his outfit was the silver watch, which has an important part to play in our story. The watch will attract the little mermaid with its shine and lead to the prince being saved. The shirt and trousers are basic fashion trends that most people wear these days. In the original story, the prince was 18 years old, which gave me an idea of comfortable shoes that are very popular now and everyone is wearing them, especially young people. However, when I presented the sketch of the prince to my group they said it was too casual for a classy guy like him. I change them to more elegant shoes with a fish scale pattern to express his interest in the ocean.
As for the hairstyle, I was inspired by Korean pop stars. Our story happens in Japan, so I thought of giving the prince a trendy look. Apart from making him trendy and beautiful according to Korean beauty standards, I also gave him specific eyes that look attractive but also make the prince look like a careless, obnoxious, and spoiled rich kid. I believe this expresses the character of the prince and the lack of interest in the little mermaid. It is the look in his eyes that suggests that he is not happy about the mermaid being interested in him but also shows the kind of confidence to play with somebody's feelings.
I am very happy with the design of a prince and the fact that I managed to pull off the look that gives away his intentions towards the mermaid.
The Witch
When we were originally creating mood boards and sharing ideas with my group, I looked into Slovenian water demons that appear in myths and folktales in Polish culture. I presented it to my group as an inspiration for a witch design. We strongly agree that we need something more than a swamp witch, Rusalka or river demons. My group liked the colour palette consisting of dark green colours. we could use these to create a dark mood at the end of the story as it gets tragic.
We all agreed that I designed a lot of characters, and someone else who didn't contribute much to character designs should do it. I hope this mood board will come in handy to whoever do the witch design.