# Can you help me improve my character design?



## Ben Dragon 81037 (Jun 24, 2015)

Hey there.

This is going to be a rather big starter post as there's a lot to cover when it comes to my fursona as it stands at the moment.

I will refer "My fursona" as "My character" for the rest of this post, because it's a character that I made up to represent myself when I Role Play with my friends.

So lets start with what we already have since that would stand you in good standing on how I can improve the way I draw my character.

The basics of my character:

The big problem when it came to first designing my character, which is whether to pick the base of my character to be based on either an eastern or western dragon as choosing one or the other would have a lot of impact on how my character looks as a whole.

I know it isn't very clear here http://bendragon1337.deviantart.com/art/My-avatar-360055921 (please excuse the transparent right wing) but I went for a western dragon look, but I've never really been satisfied with how it looked (for reasons which don't really belong on this thread).

I chose it, soley on the fact that it gives a much more realistic appearance, as if it can actually fly.

So my first question is: What would it take for an eastern dragon to fly within the natural world? As I don't really like the answer "It flies just because it does" as I find it's a cop out of reality.

I changed the version of the western dragon to be a slender dragon (as in, thin), for the reason that it makes it look more appealing compared to the other style.

The next point, is that my character isn't really "human" in any way, shape or form as it produces the wrong body build for any "high speed flying".

As for https://forums.furaffinity.net/threads/70402-Applying-Human-Anatomy-to-a-Furry-Character which I've read from top to bottom, and I know you're going to hate me for this, but I chose the digigrade legs as they on the basis that it allows my character to walk either upright or on all fours easier compared to the other types.

The tail provides 3 functions:
It provides balance for my character when in flight.
It helps my character balance while transferring between all fours and upright stances.
It's flexible so that it can grasp objects.

My character also has a pouch, to enable it to carry stuff as my character doesn't really "wear" clothes in the traditional sense, due to how many alterations I'd have to make to the clothes just to make them fit, not to mention cutting holes into the wings as the entire wing joins onto the body's entire length.

As for paws (both front and behind), I'm not really sure what's really "the best" option, because traditional canine paws don't really grasp objects, yet their wrists allows them to run extremely fast on all fours.

In fact, I have no idea what style of paw / claw to choose when it comes to my character design, I was wondering if you could help me out with that including the pros and cons of them?

The entire head is designed to be aerodynamic to enable it to cut through the air like a knife through butter.

But when it comes to designing my character, it's often quite hard, because the skeleton would be quite complex, for a first creation, but the thing I have trouble with the most, would be the head, with the accessories on it.

So how do you normally draw the skeleton of the head, muzzle and ears to give it a realistic look and feel to it? Edit: I'd like to learn because currently, I'm not fluid enough with character design.

Not to mention the character's appearance is susceptible to change, granted that it is a shape shifter.

Sorry for the long post, my character's very original and in order for you to help me, I need to jot everything down in a logical and straight forward way, after all, I need to help you in order to help me improve.

Good luck.

P.S. I use inkscape as my main drawing tool.

Edit: Actually now that I think about it, it's not so much the design itself, it's more about how to draw the skeleton better which would lead to better proportions, as well as drawing many of the accessories mentioned above, improving how they look and such.


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## Centradragon (Jun 28, 2015)

First off â€” you're asking for help, but you explain way too much about your character. I struggled to read through this. You're way too focused on details that don't matter, instead of looking at the big picture.




> So my first question is: What would it take for an eastern dragon to fly within the natural world? As I don't really like the answer "It flies just because it does" as I find it's a cop out of reality.



It doesn't have to fit the natural world, but it should fit the rules of YOUR world. A western dragon couldn't technically exist on Earth, either. They'd be too heavy, too unwieldy, and in the scheme of evolution WHY would there be a reptile with 6 limbs when all vertebrates have 4? How could a bipedal dragon fly with wings on its upper back, when its center of gravity would be near its hips? Where do the muscles go in relation to its arms? 

You could nitpick until you're blue in the face, but sometimes it's okay to make things up. Figure out some rules you can work with, and design your character around that. Is he an anomaly? Did magic or a science experiment graft wings on his back? Is he a god beyond the rules of science? Are 6-limbed creatures common where he's from? You don't have to have a 10-page backstory to have a very general idea of world rules.





> So how do you normally draw the skeleton of the head, muzzle and ears to give it a realistic look and feel to it?



Easy â€” look at real animals and study their anatomy. If you're concerned about it being aerodynamic, look at the head of birds, aquatic animals like fish/whales, and flying reptiles like pterosaurs. If you like the look of how a fox head looks or something, you could always "adapt" the fox head to be more aerodynamic and similar to a dolphin or something.





> Not to mention the character's appearance is susceptible to change, granted that it is a shape shifter.



If you're basing your character on realism, this should make your mind explode. You could always go the animorphs route and say that their organs get transported into zero-space or something, but really... why do all these little details matter if your character can change on a whim? Maybe he likes to go plantigrade on Sundays so he can wear nice shoes to church.


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## Ben Dragon 81037 (Jun 28, 2015)

Centradragon said:


> First off â€” you're asking for help, but you explain way too much about your character. I struggled to read through this. You're way too focused on details that don't matter, instead of looking at the big picture.


 There's a lot to get through, I know, but I don't really know how to make it clearer, if you have any suggestions, I'd like to hear them.



Centradragon said:


> It doesn't have to fit the natural world, but it should fit the rules of YOUR world.


Okay, fair enough.



Centradragon said:


> A western dragon couldn't technically exist on Earth, either. They'd be too heavy, too unwieldy, and in the scheme of evolution WHY would there be a reptile with 6 limbs when all vertebrates have 4?


Admittedly, the bone structure is a tough one, because, like you said, the muscles have to go somewhere, and the chest in the drawing I drew is far too narrow, the chest region needs to be expanded a little bit, and the bones need to be adjusted to accommodate the wings.



Centradragon said:


> How could a bipedal dragon fly with wings on its upper back, when its center of gravity would be near its hips? Where do the muscles go in relation to its arms?


There's absolutely no possibility that the dragon can take off while being bipedal, given that the wings are attached to the back.

It could take off when on all fours though, which is what the digigrade legs are for.

Addition: The centre of gravity would be at the hips with the tail stretched out, this enables it to pitch up, the tail helps stabilise the character in flight.



Centradragon said:


> You could nitpick until you're blue in the face, but sometimes it's okay to make things up. Figure out some rules you can work with, and design your character around that. Is he an anomaly? Did magic or a science experiment graft wings on his back? Is he a god beyond the rules of science? Are 6-limbed creatures common where he's from? You don't have to have a 10-page backstory to have a very general idea of world rules.


Though the backstory of the character is undisclosed (the imagination of the readers can make up their own version), here's the gist of how it could go:

The character exists in a world which is similar to our own, but with a few differences.

A few differences is that it's a world that's been set in a similar setting as our own, similar history, but aliens bring in trinkets (various bits and pieces of "advanced equipment") every so often, which the "primitive race" could use for either good or bad purposes.

The character that I'm talking about, has no idea where he came from (He had lost all of the memories due to a strange artificial transformation process which happened in a year which could be associated with the 60s.

Somewhere in the transformation process, he got implanted with what could only be described as an artificial pre-set thought process, which erased everything, and sort of "pre-programmed" him to think in a certain way, which he eventually broke out of, but never been able to recover his memories.





Centradragon said:


> Easy â€” look at real animals and study their anatomy. If you're concerned about it being aerodynamic, look at the head of birds, aquatic animals like fish/whales, and flying reptiles like pterosaurs. If you like the look of how a fox head looks or something, you could always "adapt" the fox head to be more aerodynamic and similar to a dolphin or something.


Alright, thank you.



Centradragon said:


> If you're basing your character on realism, this should make your mind explode. You could always go the animorphs route and say that their organs get transported into zero-space or something, but really... why do all these little details matter if your character can change on a whim? Maybe he likes to go plantigrade on Sundays so he can wear nice shoes to church.


Perhaps... It's a neat idea. He just likes to be a dragon because he likes the form of it and designed it in such a way that he doesn't have to change very often (it's very hard to keep track of who someone is always changing).

Edit: The gist of the first post was to help me design the character to make it possible to work in reality (It doesn't really work at the moment), excluding the whole shape shifting stuff since that only works in fiction, the post was designed to get to grips of the character's abilities and what it looked like in the imagination, which is why I needed to go into a lot of detail about that.


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## SodaBubbles (Jul 4, 2015)

Actually, it would not be impossible for a bipedal being to fly. Difficult, yes, but not impossible. With correctly sized wings for flight, they would have to be able to leap upward while bringing the wings down in a downstroke, which would further propel them upward. I say this because any of my bipedal winged characters (as yet undrawn, alas) all require being able to do this, since their wings are big enough they'd hit the ground otherwise. 

I recommend, since he doesn't wear clothing, that you attach his wings fully over his back from shoulder to hip, which will enhance the realism of his being able to fly. Since you mentioned paws and claws, I'd suggest a hybridization between canid and lizard type feet, with similar pads and shaping, but with longer digits to give dexterity.

As for skull and ear design, I'd suggest something between animal type positioning (near the top of the head) and human type positioning (sides of the head), although it's something that's largely aesthetic. So whatever looks best for ear placement. Draw a style you like, and figure out where it looks best on the head. For the skull, it's pretty much the same. My own choices for skull design tend to revolve around whether or not the character will have hair, and how humanoid I want their face to look. A taller skull emphasizes the human-like features, while a shorter skull (like a lizard or a dog) would emphasize more animal features.

I also suggest doing a lot of work on paper before finalizing anything. It's hard, and it's a pain, I know, but in the end it can be worth it. If you'd like any other advice or tips, please note me on FA, sometimes I forget the forums exist. XD (i lurked a bit for close to a year before joining)


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## Ben Dragon 81037 (Jul 5, 2015)

I'd agree wholey on it.

I've been looking up the bone structure of a dragon, and yes, there are no vertebrates with 6 limbs, but I did find something interesting about it on the internet http://draconian.com/body/body.htm.

It's funny that you mention a hybrid between a canid and lizard type feet in particular, because I was considering that as well.

As for the eye placement, I'll need to experiment with my character.


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## Hell_Charm (Jul 5, 2015)

The drawing of you character reminded me of this one: http://goldenwolf.deviantart.com/art/Blue-Storm-388347411
I think the anatomy is this drawing is highly plausible :3 hope this might help you


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## Willow (Jul 5, 2015)

you can always combine elements from both eastern and western dragons, it doesn't have to be one over the other. Hell it really doesn't have to even be classified as either. Mine for example, is neither, it just has the horns of an eastern dragon and a bit of fluff but other than that it's my own design. 

And as someone else has already mentioned, you're really hung up on details that really don't matter. No one will really care if your character fits into reality. If we did, the majority of fursonas wouldn't really be able to talk because their jaws don't allow for it.


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## PrettyKitty13 (Jul 5, 2015)

I think it's fine to worry about the details of your character.
But before you do that, you need to decide on the basics, then build on top of it.
Since you're RPing with him, the details do matter, but keep them much more simple. You'll pull your hair out if you go back and forth between deciding the body mass to the amount of bones in his body.


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## Ben Dragon 81037 (Jul 6, 2015)

Hell_Charm said:


> The drawing of you character reminded me of this one: http://goldenwolf.deviantart.com/art/Blue-Storm-388347411
> I think the anatomy is this drawing is highly plausible :3 hope this might help you


Yes, it has a highly similar body structure, the problem is, learning how to draw as good as that.




Willow said:


> you can always combine elements from both eastern and western dragons, it doesn't have to be one over the other. Hell it really doesn't have to even be classified as either. Mine for example, is neither, it just has the horns of an eastern dragon and a bit of fluff but other than that it's my own design.
> 
> 
> And as someone else has already mentioned, you're really hung up on details that really don't matter. No one will really care if your character fits into reality. If we did, the majority of fursonas wouldn't really be able to talk because their jaws don't allow for it.


 I've always considered the western dragon to have the more plausible body design and structure compared to an eastern dragon.




PrettyKitty13 said:


> I think it's fine to worry about the details of your character.
> But before you do that, you need to decide on the basics, then build on top of it.
> Since you're RPing with him, the details do matter, but keep them much more simple. You'll pull your hair out if you go back and forth between deciding the body mass to the amount of bones in his body.


 Admittedly, I approached the design of my character from the top down, first thinking about what my character could have (with a few references from research), following up with the design of it, merging the attributes with a base form as I go along, but all the same, I feel a bit of adjusting on the proportions is in order.

I think the details do matter because these small things can alter how the character acts and behaves quite significantly.

For example, imagine if the character had a harmonica in hand, what would, essentially be, a small piece of metal and plastic object that easily fits into the palm of the character's hand say to the individual seeing the creature? 

It's similar to poses and facial expressions as well.


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## Maugryph (Jul 6, 2015)

When designing a character it is best to go from general to specific. Start with the big picture and then work on the details once the 'foundation' is solid. If you start details too early, its like building a skyscraper on a mound of hay.


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## Hell_Charm (Jul 6, 2015)

Ben Dragon 81037 said:


> Yes, it has a highly similar body structure, the problem is, learning how to draw as good as that.



I usually keep my reference open all the time, when working digitally you can tile you windows next to each other, that ways it's easy to estimate proportions because you just have to trace an imaginary line to the side to get a certain point.

I also tend to start with a skeleton sketch (lines and spheres to symbolize the joints) next I add big shapes (circles, squares, triangles etc.) to get a rough version of the overall shape and in the last step start adding more and more details, building up the drawing bit by bit and that way copy the drawing first.

After finishing the first one you should have some basic understanding of how the anatomy of the creature works and you can start trying your own poses and versions of it.
It will never look as good as the one you copied, the only way to get at the same level is practice practice practice.
Doing a lot of detail studies helps as well (hand study and stuff) but all of this takes time. I'm still in the copy and alter stage myself since during the school year I lack the free time for drawing for myself but I'll get there some day  as will you if you just keep practicing a lot.


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## pixelblue (Jul 13, 2015)

Do studies.  Anatomy studies of animals with similar structure (lizards, maybe?).  Do a lizard's claw.  Draw a canine claw the same way.  Then draw a typical furry claw.  Now try and figure out what you like out of these, then combine.  The biggest thing people often don't realize about art, especially creating, is the analyzing it takes.  I'd try less to get it to "fit in" to the "real world" cause it won't--no furries are that realistic.  I understand making it realistic-ish, but you will have to take some artistic liberties.  Try instead to make what fits in to your personality.  Care more about something you're excited to create than getting every single detail "perfect" because it's going to come out a lot better when you're excited to make it.  Really, the best way to get better is to look at a lot of art, and a lot of anatomy and characters, and maybe make a list of all the things you like about them specifically.  Then try to build/change your character from there?


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## Ben Dragon 81037 (Jul 14, 2015)

I'll try that when I learn how to properly build a proper skeleton, thanks.


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