Juliette and John's hero project
My first critique is of Juliette and John's project. Individually, I thought the characters were good and original. Eros is a very original and interested "villain", and Captain Stickman is rather lame character but has a very original back story featuring a "doodling accident. My main concern is the disparity between the characters. They don't even seem remotely related, there's no chemistry, nothing to connect the two in any way.
My favorite aspect of these characters is their color schemes. Both had analog hues, Captain Stickman had Blue and yellow, while Eros had yellow, orange and red. Both featuring analog hues and primary colors give the characters some affinity despite their contrasting motives. This affinity indicates that they aren't such bad enemies or that their is hope for friendship in the future; either that or that they were made for one another. The primary colors and analog schemes make the target audience of the characters quite obviously children. Understanding that their design is geared towards young kids makes their characteristics seem fun rather than ridiculous. They also had affinity in the lighting, both characters are brightly lit, giving a sense of happiness or energy to the characters. The characters also had similar saturation, being that they are both rather vibrant in color to emphasis the light-heart and fun mood of the hero. The combination of similarity between lighting, hue, and saturation all point toward the overall art style of the concept, which embodies ideals of content designed for children
Tanner and Cam's
This is a critique of Tanner and Cams hero/villain project which features the villain Caligula and the hero who is a gladiator but his name isn't listed in their blog. They also used the properties of color, using hue, brightness and saturation. The characters had similar hues, featuring a color scheme of browns and yellows. Their affinity in hue was to show that they come from the same era, the same setting. These colors are reminiscent of ancient Rome or at least what we like to assume ancient Rome looks like. The brightness of the characters contrasts their status. The gladiator features darker colors, showing his role as a lowly slave, whereas Caligula has bright robes, showing that he is royalty. The saturation of the two would indicate the style is intended for youth, but the violence of the action would insist a middle to high school age audience.
I personally liked this project. While most groups used rather generic character designs of cliche heroes and villains who where tights and capes, Tanner and Cam had an original idea. They used a Gladiator or Spartacus type setting, but with a younger target audience. And in this world we still find a classic example of hero vs. villain and good vs. evil. Their project is original but still plays off the character components we learned about in class; I really like where they took the whole "hero/villain" assignment.