Initial Idea and Sketching

To begin with, I needed to come up with a storyline. Although it was not my plan to create a narrative, I knew that if I got this in the bag, it would help me in establishing what environment these two character are from.

WHEN INSPIRATION STRUCK..

After having getting into watching Hell's Kitchen with my housemates, I decided that I really liked the idea of having a storyline centred in a Restaurant, and/or the Restaurant Kitchen. I knew that I wanted one character who would be intimidating, and give off those "scary" vibes. I also needed a character who would work in contrast to this. So after having seen quite a lot of Gordon Ramsay screaming at trainee Chefs, I decided to go down this route. However, I wasn't so keen on the idea of having two Chefs. After much contemplation, the thought of having a young trainee Chef, and an intimidating Restaurant Manager seemed much more appealing.

During the development process for these two character I actually came up with a possible storyline, which is something I will be keeping a hold of, as I want to develop this in third year, or in my own time. However this is information that I do not yet want to divulge! This did however really influence and help my design process.

..AND SO I BEGAN TO  SKETCH LOTS.

I didn't specifically plan these sketches, they just sort of happened. However this did help me establish the type of character I wanted the Chef to be. I decided to have her as a female, because I thought this would contrast well with the Manager, who would be male. Also, the idea of her being the only female Chef in the kitchen is something that would be big contributor to the storyline.

I don't usually begin my character design process by drawing just heads, but this is where the doodling took me! Whilst sketching I realised that there were certain features that I wanted to avoid for this character.


I didn't want her to have:

• An overly sexualised physique 
• stupidly big eyes (which is something I had to rectify)
• "Perfection" - this is character who I wanted to be flawed in her own way. This would add to her element of appeal. 

I then did the same for my second character. I found that experimenting with different facial and hair structures allowed me to get a good idea of what would work well and what wouldn't.

Also, these sketches allowed me to see what features these characters would need, and what features would need I would need to avoid, in order for them to be compatible together.

After doing this, I passed my book around in order to get feedback from people on what they thought could work and what wouldn't.





After the feedback I received I knew that, the female character needed to look quite small and skinny. This would help to make it clear that she is only young and not been a chef for long. Also, I loved the idea of her uniform looking as though it is almost too big for her, again relating to the fact that she has a lot of space to grow (not literally.)

The male character would need to be much taller in height, and would need to move much differently to the way she moves. The most prominent feature on his face would need to be, wrinkles on his forehead, so suggest he is very experienced and been doing this job for a long time, as well as a very angular pointy face.

So far i knew this:

• This storyline would be set in an Italian Restaurant 
• The characters would consist of a young inexperienced female chef, who struggles to keep up with the fast incoming extent of food orders. 
• A tall, intimidating Manager, who is hard to please. 
• Both character would have similar colourings, quite olivie skin and dark hair, to make it obvious that they are italian (The storyline may not have much dialogue) 
• Their set environment would be in the kitchen of this busy restaurant. 
• I would be going about all of this in a 2D Digital format, because if I were to make this animation, this is the method I would use, because this would captured the aesthetic I wanted.