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Step six…Texture

Charley Harper used geometric pattern to imply texture. This inspired my illusion of fur on Chimp. Fur is different on different animals. Even within the same species there can be huge differences in the feel and appearance of fur. Just look at humans and note the extreme variety in head hair. So too, animals show much variety in fur. Chimp’s fur is scraggly not soft. It is raised off the skin and in some areas dense and in other areas sparse. The fur is one color and darker than the skin itself. It grows downward. It rarely reflects light. It does not interfere with the shadows that describe the form.

Returning to Charley Harper style, I asked what is the essential shape of Chimp’s fur?  Experimentation followed. After trying a multitude of shapes I decided that the basic shape for his/her fur was a single straight path. A single vertical black stroked path started the fur, then with the Transform Effects in Illustrator I copied the stroke but angled it slightly, then raised the copy, then lowered an additional copy. I made a row of these stroked paths and then a second row slightly off center. Basically I built a pattern of simple strokes. It took a lot of trial and error, but I loved every minute of it.

Once the fur pattern was established it was time to apply it to a body shape. It didn’t matter which part of the body, so I picked a leg. The texture required two separate shapes stacked on top of each other. As seen in the photo, the basic leg is just filled with flat gray or simple gradients (the silhouette of the leg was established). On top of the silhouette, a copy of the exact same leg is placed, BUT the copy has two effects applied. One effect was a mezzotint appearance, which changed the look of the gradient into specks. The second effect was an offset path, which took the mezzotint effect and extended it out past the edge of the path.

Now it was time to add the fur pattern. First I used Expand Appearance on the fur pattern to make it permanent (not just a series of effect appearances).  Then I made of copy of the leg with all its mezzotint and offset path effects. I used Expand Appearance on the copy and then Pathfinder> Unite to build one single shape. My new shape became a clipping path/mask for the fur texture. Once the fur texture was clipped to shape, it was placed on top of the leg.

Each body part was completed in the same manner. There were lots of adjustments along the way. The final Chimp turned out pretty much like what you see here, but with color (not left gray). This character was so much fun to develop and build. It took a ton of explorations and experiments, and in the end I feel I made a Charley Harper inspired chimp ready for movement and adaptations.

Step five…the modular, moveable character

Chimp is a character within a children’s book therefore he/she is an actor. Chimp must express emotion, gesture and story. I want this character to stay true to the Charley Harper style that inspired him/her in the first place. The tiniest movement of a line (path), the smallest positioning of a shape, the slight alteration of a value or color will make all the difference in the audience’s reaction and engagement. 

With the front view of the chimp’s face designed, I make measurement guides (to keep proportions correct) and build a couple more point-of-views for the head.

The head is not finished yet, but it is far enough along that I can leave it and start working on the body. I’m not sure what all the poses will be for Chimp, so I read the manuscript and pick out a few poses that will most likely be used. I sculpt the character directly in Illustrator. This approach may not work for all styles, but for my Charley Harper style I think it works. And besides I am truly enjoying the 2-D sculpting process.  

In the photographs that follow you can see a variety of poses for Chimp. You also see the character’s inside structure. The character is modularly built from a series of shapes that mimic the skeletal/muscular system. He/she even has joints (usually circles). Anytime I want Chimp to raise an arm or point a finger, I select the body parts needed and rotate them into position. In many ways I am a puppet master. In fact the idea to work this way started by looking at jointed paper puppets, the ones that often use metal paper fasteners for joints.

I think that this method has stayed true to the Charley Harper aesthetic and it has also opened up the door for me to design actual paper puppets to match the characters in this book.

Step four…Sculpting in 2-D

So far my steps are pretty standard for a lot of artists. Now is the time I deviate from a normal process (or so I think). As most close friends know, I adore working with Adobe Illustrator. I love the precision, the ease of selection, the fluid ability to alter and change, and the Undo button. I love that Illustrator allows me to build, to take a shape and combine more shapes to it, or remove parts of shapes. I love that I can develop a unique style by combining and playing with the abundance of tools. I have worked with Illustrator for over ten years now, and have never grown tired of it. I feel like this software is an ever-expanding medium. The more I know, the more there is to know. Truly my creativity has grown faster and easier with the use of Illustrator (and my Wacom tablet).

Adobe Illustrator is a vector drawing and design program, which means that unlike Photoshop, in Illustrator we work with paths. Photoshop works with pixels.  The paths in Illustrator are constructed with anchor points that hold the path down, and direction handles that allow the artist to pull and adjust the curve, slope and direction of the path. For a typical circle there are 4 of these anchor points. To make this all a bit clearer I developed videos for the classes I teach. Here is the link to the series of videos that cover anchor points and direction handles.

Anchor Points and Direction Handles

Back to my chimpanzee… since I studied (by drawing and clay sculpting) the essential structure of the chimp, I am now ready to develop the character using paths in Illustrator. I started with the overall silhouette shape of the head. I asked myself what basic shape is the head? I decided upon a circle. Then I asked myself, what basic shape is the muzzle? Or I should say, what basic shapes could be used to build the muzzle since the muzzle is a detailed and complicated portion of the face? In the following photograph (look left to right, top to bottom) you can see the building progression from simple geometric paths to final structure.

As I crafted the chimp’s head in Illustrator, I noticed that I was adding shapes to the head, which reminded me of adding clumps of clay to the clay head version. I also removed pieces of shapes from the Illustrator version, which reminded me of removing pieces of clay from the clay head version.  Traditional sculpture normally falls into three processes, either additive, or subtractive or a combination of both. I realized that in essence I was using traditional additive and subtractive methods in Adobe Illustrator.  So I decided to call this process Sculpting in 2D.

To further the comparison between my Illustrator and my traditional clay sculpture processes I noticed that I would select an anchor point and nudge or push the point to a new position. I would pull a direction handle to adjust the curve of the path. This subtle pushing and pulling of anchor points and direction handles was exactly like taking clay and subtly pushing and pulling the clay into the desired form. I love this connection between a traditional sculpting process and working in Illustrator.