Initial Thoughts and Ideas II

As I added details to the sketch, it changed quite a lot. Instead of being a queen, I wanted her to look a bit stronger. As a character, Noelle evolved into someone who defies gender roles and constricting traditional values, so I wanted her to be something other than a sterotypical princess type. I was playing around with different design ideas when the shadow/ reflection idea came up. I was thinking of ways to express the ideals that Noelle was breaking away from and this seemed like a great way to do this. I refined the Noelle in the frontground into a slightly more powerful, untraditional version of herself, and I liked this version batter than any of the others.

Initial Thoughts/ Character Background

The piece was initially going to be featuring Noelle and her partner in crime, Jayme. The idea was to be a major contrast to show how different they are- Noelle being a princess and Jayme being a pauper. However, I changed my mind on this idea when I noticed the lack of impact. The idea had no main objective, no real focal point.

My second idea, which I worked off of for most of this project, was to show Noelle as a queen. I liked the idea because it made her a powerful individual, which is what she's striving to become. At this point she had no clear background, but I really liked the idea, so I stuck with it. It did evolve quite a bit throughout the process, but the original idea of individualism and independance remained mostly the same.

Initial Thoughts/ Character Background III

The character featured in the piece, Noelle, lives in a steampunk inspired time period., and is a princess about to become a queen. The gender roles of the time are strict; women are expected to find a husband as quickly as possible and submit to him fully. As a princess, Noelle is especially confined by these values. However, she has no desire to submit to the roles of the time period. She wants to have a say in what happens in her life and in the ruling of her people. This is reflected in the piece through Noelle's reflection in the piece in comparison to her actual self. It also is shown by Noelle's posture, clothing, and expressions. I tried to draw her as a strong, independant, in control individual. I also used contrasting colors to make Noelle stand out from her reflection. Her goggles, top hat, coattails, and the numerous buttons were to help her fit with the time period, though women would usually be wearing dresses. The bubblegum was to give a pop of color, and to represent the color pink on Noelle. The pink in this picture seem to be mostly associated with her more feminine reflection, and I wanted to bring some of that into the central figure. In this screenshot, the piece isn't finished, and her reflection is basically a floating head, but this is the basic idea.