I developed a set of anthropomorphic unicorn character designs for the crypto company Monoceros Finance. The design sheets aligned with their current branding, consisting of a vibrant palette and quirky unicorn characters, and defined cohesive rules in comparison to the inconsistencies found in their current AI generated graphics.
Monoceros Finance
2024
My client initially approached me to adapt existing AI-generated anthropomorphic horse graphics used on their website into a set of decisive character designs. The issue they were facing with their original AI-generated graphics was that there was a lack of consistency and refinement each time the images were generated.
As for what the character design sheets should contain, we decided on 360 degree character turnarounds composed of 4 side views and 4 emotion poses. The style of the characters was to remain consistent to the AI images and their palette should follow the website/company’s current branding. This was emphasized as the branding would not be changing in combination with the new characters.
To create a distinct look and feel per each of the characters, personas were also assigned:
With a goal of wanting the characters to be reproduced with consistency by future illustrators, I only incorporated the essential visual features that would communicate their persona:
I avoided uncanny features like hooves for fingers and humanistic eyes which were previously generated in the AI images. Choosing to add them in again could be unsettling or confusing for viewers and I felt that such reactions could distract from associating positive emotions to the characters.
I purposefully omitted patterns and fine details. I had an opportunity to add on a detailed gold pendant with the logo of the company for the Male Bi-Ped character but opted for a cleaner, chunky chain that could still be distinguishable at a smaller scale. I followed the same principle with other small scaled jewelry.
This project was the first time I had ever tackled character design where I had to put in extra consideration with how my creative choices, the rules on the character’s visual features, would impact future uses of the characters in other forms of media. Knowing that illustrators in the future could receive my sheets and reproduce what I’ve defined was also an entirely new experience as my past projects had involved singular illustrations that had no repeated use.