I've never seen a character design artist talk about gestures or body language as an integral part of the character design process. But now that I hear your explanation, it makes total sense.

The subtle tilt of the left foot is the kind of detail that brings a gesture to life. Good job.

I can honestly see this character in a Souls game. The hat especially gives me Abyss Watcher vibes

See, maybe a shield with a handle facing your adversary is a bad idea, but maybe a creative player might notice it and take advantage of it.

Absolutely love the design you ended up with!

Omg, that laugh about the cauldron parts being witchy and knight like was adorable haha

A REALLY good tip about character design: If you can identify all your characters by their shadow/silhouette alone it's good character design. A good example? Bad apple video, Tohou series is the perfect how to do.

That list for what you wanted to combine with your knight included so many entrances that I’d never have thought of and the execution really adds a lot of character and story! Out of interest, what is your approach when writing character stories? And do you start with the image or the story?

Map Crow: *I like to look at Pokemon for good silhouettes* Meanwhile Pokemon: It's a jigglypuff viewed from above!

100% agree with the T-pose stuff, those are only good for reference sheet of an already designed character's visuals, and shouldn't be used for establishing a new design!

Oh man....I didn't realize how much I actually liked your artstyle. Do you take commissions? Haha I really like the idea of the silhouettes, I've been struggling with my wizard character and this sounds like a great place to start

This is genuinely incredible. It's like unraveling arcan secrets about drawing but in such a small video. Simply incredible

I really love this video, so helpful. Also, gives tons of inspiration to do some art, thanks!

i genuinely feel like this changed my outlook for character design. The shape iteration was an eye opening thing to learn.

The witch knight has a spell on the shield handle, so that anyone who grabs it is put to sleep/poisoned/hypnotized/burned that way it has a strategic element 😊

I like this creator because he talks a lot about character design. He’s got many years of experience, and he's really good at drawing ANYTHING. For example maps, monsters, and such. In this video he talks about character design in general. He mentions silhouettes, body language, gestures and the like. He’s also got a great art style, which I like a lot. He’s very knowledgeable about art. I love the finished design, because it’s dynamic and very interesting-looking!

I love the idea of having a table for different kinds of knights!

Team Fortess 2 has incredible silhouette and body language with its characters

I would love to see your process of character design for a kind, intellectual, empathetic, helpful, adorable HoBo!

Man be like "silhouette" and starts creating every possible combination of things my brain can't come up with.

i just found your channel through the questing beast newsletter and i backed your zine and im sooooo glad i did

The approach I usually start off with is a very pragmatic consideration of who this character is, and how they would equip themselves as a result, prioritizing functionality over aesthetics, which I think can work quite well if you are aiming for a more grounded style.

I never though of doing silhouettes like this! Totally gonna do this next time I do concept art.

This is one of the best character design videos I’ve seen recently! Super helpful info and demonstrations, and I really like your drawing style! Please please PLEASE make more character design videos!!

eldritch knight? nay. tis the ill witch knight!

This video is extremely helpful and I have no idea why this channel isn’t more popular now! I know I’m a little late to the party, but thanks for this vid!

i've seen tons of videos about character design but this one was honestly so efficient at explaining these 2 concepts. great job ! Just found out about your channel, love it already :)

I want to say thank you for making this video. I been drawing small templates sketch of my characters before finalizing it, but this crash course really help make me understand what I should look for.

Really appreciate your very loose sketches as someone who taught themselves very tightly from an early stage in they're art journey. Its good to relax and have fun in early stages

This Video just randomly showed up in my feed... and I'm already in love. The vibe of it all, the easy to understand lesson, and the design are all wonderfull! Great video, I'm glad you showed up in the feed

This was by far the most helpful character design video I have seen. Thank you so much!

Incredible advice!! And so succinct. And cool design at the end to boot. Thanks for putting this together. 'Crash course" really well deserved :)

I agree with some of the other commenters, I love that silhouette isn't the end of the argument in this process, I love how you really push it with gesture and pose

Randomly found this channel (thanks KZfaq algo!) Just want to say thanks for breaking concepts down into easily manageable parts but not overprescribing what to do. Love your channel!!

I can't stop re watching this

I found this channel today and I really like it, like seriously keep up the great work

dude thank you! Struggling with a design for a roleplay and this is gonna help me out a lot

I feel like i've learned a lot from a short video, and also I absolutely adore your Witch Knight

Wow. Amazing skills and finesse.

This is so amazingly cool

Absolutely amazing!

This helped out a lot. Also I love the concept of a witch knight and think your design is awesome.

Belo trabalho! Suas artes são incriveis e seu conteudo melhor ainda.

That's an awkward way to hold a broom. I always struggle with hands holding things in my drawing. Speaking of witch knight reminds me of an episode of The Big Knights where they start their own Knights school and all the monsters joined it. Trio of witches in full metal armour. But the dragon had me in stitches.

Moar! A speed draw of these would make amazing shorts and I would watch all of them!

Thank You Thank You SO MUCH! Your process was very useful and inspiring to Me You're good on this btw

i absolutely love this!

Love this!

Fantastic advice! Really helpful, thank you 🤘

What I learnt from this is that even good artists can also draw crappy little doodles like me. Maybe there's hope for me after all.

Thank you! Just subscribed!

I love your witch knight it looks so cool!

What a great little video! I will for sure add this steps to my creative process. Liked and suscribed

spectacular!

God I love this design. I Want to try and make a collection of sketches like that now that I'm getting into drawing.

Witch knight is just the best prompt. I want franchises upon franchises around witch knights now…

i'd love to see more character design videos from you. I really enjoyed this video, i have more of an interest in characters than mapmaking, though you make both enjoyable

Thank you so much for making this video very helpful liked and subscribed!!!

thats so awesome bro, you inspire me to write my own story one day

Thank you!

Map Crow, your style is lovely. I've been a defeated artist for almost a decade, completely unable to draw, and yet watching your creative process makes me want to pick up the pencil again. Thanks for your hard work!

as a developing artist who works in the ttrpg sphere, i feel like i found a diamond finding your channel :)

Just found this chanel, this video is an awesome first inpression.

The artistic genius of this man is almost… frightening.

i loooooooooooooove your artstyle , amazing ✨__✨

really cool stuff here

yaa!! this is very cool thank you!

The metal witch is really interesting because it might not be the most impractical thing. The way it’s shaped is kind of like a pikeman’s helmet, with the large metal rim and a indent in the top for your head to go, of course the indent on the witch hat is definitely more pronounced. It’s just a really interesting piece of armor design.

Amazing

that was really good, make more, i like watching while drawing

Great video. I would argue though that T poses are helpful when searching for an initial design or when you want to iterate on one specific design because it helps with seeing proportions clearly and it makes comparing designs to each other much easier.

love the art good points subscribed

bro good shit this is dope asf

I really love the witch knight design

amazing as always, mate!

i feel silly, but i learned these skills in unrelated contexts in college, but i was never a character designer, so it never occurred to me that they'd still apply here

The poses really help convey intention and personality, but it's hard finding pose references by vibe... got any suggestions for finding poses by emotion? Also, I've never done thumbnail sketches before, but I'm going to start doing that! I usually do full sketches, and then the character usually changes over time until it settles, but finalizing a design prior to that seems like a good, but obvious idea

Step aside Shovel Knight because, Witch Knight is here!

Kobold music

Thanks for artificer wizard build idea for my next dnd game

For this knight I like that the shield makes them have a tactic that has temptation to grab the shield out of their hand but the opponent does not know its strapped to the arm so they pull the knight in perfect distance.

I love to see a video of a merchant adventurer or a traveling merchant concept and for the traveling merchant his backpack can fold out and become a merchant stand anywhere without magic

Love the laugh at 4:56 lol

Hm. This is extremely useful. I’ll need to try some of these ideas…

I've never felt so affirmed. I do not draw, though I would like to, but I do write and the silhouette and body language are something I consider even in a non visual medium. One of the ideas I've had (and actually drawn) is a towering gaunt emaciated wendigo crooked and slumped over back character to a more well grown chiseled paragon style body shape. Similar to the before and after pictures. You can tell a story with a single design, but when you include that extra dimension to characters of time, who knows what you can do? Also, I'd like to comment on the listing technique at the start. That is exactly Neil Gaiman's technique when writing

I would totally make a broom-lance from that weapon

NICE!!!

This is really amazing. I wish I was at least decent at drawing.

It might be late, but cauldron pauldrons!

This design is pretty rad. The art style especially is perfect with those heavy lines, but I think you could have had the shield be a cauldron lid that they're holding by the handle, instead of putting the handle on the outside.

MOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAARRRR!🤤🤤🤤

Brilliantly summarized, love it! Also, is that just a standard 2b school pencil? I used to draw exclusively with Eagle 2b pencils, the lead was so soft and you would quickly get these nice thick soft lines like you're getting here. Time to pick up some more of those I say!

nice art

That is one very witchy knight

Do you have any advice or good videos that cover the topic of balancing your values?

T poses are there for the reference sheet, mostly for animation.

now i just need to learn how to actually draw :D

Do you have any tips on how to design the likeness of realistic characters? For example, the last of us and uncharted kind of characters? I know in some examples, they have a model reference, but I heard in Elle's case, she was design by artists in the Last of Us 2.

Never heard of starting with a silhouette before, curious

I loved this video, you definitely got a sub from me!