Turnarounds

“no man ever became great or good except through many & great Mistakes. I have learned more from my mistakes than from my successes. “- William Gladstone

Building a character turnaround is tricky but is a great exercise to learn how to retain the appearance of a character from all angles.  The Key here is thinking of your character in terms of VOLUME rather than just flat line.  Refer to the post on THINKING IN 3D.  

Wether you are an illustrator doing a comic or chidren's book, an animator animating a character or a concept artist, you will need to be able to design a character that looks good at all angles and be able to redraw it accurately again and again.

Drawing a turnaround of a character will not only help you better understand your character, but also reveal flaws in it's design.  Your goal should be for your character to be interesting, appealing, understandable and recognizable from all angles.

Steps to a Character Turnaround:

1) Selecting a pose - look for interest, good silhouettes and be aware of extreme foreshortening 

• Start with a 3/4 view

2) Identify Landmarks that will be consistent - Draw Guide lines at these points

3) Draw the skeleton or basic shape construction - work out flaws in your design/pose

4) Use perspective boxes as needed

5) Use Reference as needed.

Key Points to this exercise:

1) retain the appearance/integrity/readability of the character
2) ensure that the character is appealing and interesting from all angles.
3) reveal flaws and weaknesses of design

1) Selecting a Pose

The best way to do turnarounds is to start with a 3/4 view and then spin him around in your mind to get the other views.

For major characters, there are generally four to five drawings that need to be done: Front View, 3/4 Front View, Side View, 3/4 Back View, and/or Back View. For minor characters, usually only a Front 3/4 View and a Back 3/4 View are needed."

For your assignment you will be doing a 3/4 (either side), Front, Back and Side - Just like Tarzan here.

There are different types of turnarounds - be aware which is most appropriate for your purpose

TYPES OF TURNAROUNDS 
Single Pose:  If new at this, the best kind of turnaround to start with is a simple single pose turnaround.  this means that you are drawing a character in exactly the same pose from various angles.  This is valuable as it allows the artist to concentrate on accurately drawing the character and their pose from different angles rather than fiddling with a new gesture each time.

This is what you will be doing in your assignment.   Look for ways to make your pose simple and uncomplicated but still interesting and appropriate to the character.

Multiple Pose Turnaround:  this is where the character is drawn from various angles, in various actions and activities.  This is used by an artist to show how different angles of the character may look while it is in action and is more helpful in helping establish the personality of a character, rather than just his construction.

T-pose Turnaround:  The purpose is to make sure the storyboard artists, animators, and/or computer modelers can re-create the character accurately. The function is not to entertain, but primarily to inform.  A T-pose is a stagnant neutral pose (often with the arms out in a T) that allows a 3-D modeler to quickly see all necessary information so that they can sculpt it accurately in the computer where it can then be handed off to other team members.


2) Identify Landmarks


Landmarks are points in your pose or character that will be consistent in your character, even as he turns in space.  Think of these as an anchor or point of rotation even.  These landmarks can simply be the top or bottom of the head, a shoulder, a knee or even a point on the clothing.  From these Points you will draw a construction line that will act as a ruler or guide in keeping the character accurate as it is drawn from different angles.   When turning the pose 360 degrees, at any point, these lines will match up with the pose in its various angles. thus when drawing different views you can use these landmark lines to ensure that the head, knees, shoulders, feet (landmarks) etc. will all be correctly drawn relative to each other.

3) Draw the Skeleton and basic shape construction


Make sure that your design uses good shapes, that you can break down, simplify and easily turn in space.

You must remember that you are drawing shapes and forms, not Lines! As said by Peter Emslie - young students will try just drawing with lines and will quickly lose control of their drawings.  
You can never draw the same line twice and you will quickly get frustrated, which is why your character should be based on good shapes and design, not just a lucky line.  if you are consistently running into frustration, you likely need to strengthen your design, step back and rethink what shapes are actually making up your character.  Use clay if need be.

Before drawing out your character, solve these important issues by drawing out your skeleton and simple volume shapes.  Especially at different angles, understand how a limb or feature will change perspective.

4) Perspective Boxes

Similar to Landmark Lines, Cubes drawn in perspective around your character can help you understand  how your character is fitting in space and how you may need to foreshorten certain features or indicate their volume.  This is especially useful for any character that takes up much horizontal space,  (vs. vertical space.  a simple standing character takes up very little horizontal space, compared to this example by Stanchfield of a lunging character.)  This may be useful for your particular pose, or if your character has a tail, a prop, or a costume, any of which may take up enough horizontal area that perspective will need to be taken into account.





5) Reference

It may sometimes be tricky to figure out how a certain shape, bit of costume or even anatomy may change when rotated slightly.  This is when reference should be use.
whether using clay, rough play dough, a digital modeling program, or even just your kneaded eraser, this is a way you can help yourself see your characters key shapes in space and translate them on your paper.  

Maquettes - This can be particularly helpful for a character in an ongoing project - having a tactile piece of reference can help the design retain its integrity and accuracy even over time after many, many drawings.  This can also be useful later when lighting your character.  A Maquette is especially useful when it must be understood and drawn by various artists. Sometimes they are even scanned by a laser which translates the info into a modeling program that builds a version based on the scan of your physical maquette.

Use Live reference as well.  sometimes nothing beats a helpful roommate or a good photograph of a living model - especially when trying to figure out accurate anatomy or costume.  Just remember, with photographic reference remember its just that, "reference," and not a substitute or crutch for good design.

DEMOS

Peter Emslie - on drawing a character constructively (volume, not lines) - make sure to watch Part 1 and Part 2

The problem with drawing line by line is that you end up with a drawing out of control that doesn't have the strength to do what you want it to do...Drawing with form, you can easily redraw a character in many different poses.

"Im thinking of sculpting that form - not merely drawing outlines. A sculpture on the page. " - 1:18

For more sources on Turnarounds:

http://www.studio2ndstreet.com/tutorials/s2s_HeadDrwgChrctrDesign.pdf - Discusses Turnarounds as well as Design Cheats in recognizable characters.

The secret to drawing characters consistently and expressively - Lora Innes

Woulter Tulp - animated turnaround