Working on a character design. It´s 6 year old (human years) African Love Bird. Still in the design phase, may remove or color line work for final design. I have settled on these key features as essential for the look I am after. Added eyebrows for expression and "whites" of eyes to alllow for iris movement.
My background is realism (attached example) so sometimes I struggle with being too literal, even when cartooning/illustrating. Sorry moderators, I attached a "non illustration" just to show what I am used to doing.
It took tons of iterations to keep chopping features to get to the most crucial ones and simplify them. I plan to remove the pupils. This will allow me to vary the size of the iris/pupil as one unit for a greater range of expression w/o concern over separate pupil.
Thoughts?
Oh, the book is about a lil bird that gets separated from its fam and rescued by an explorer and now has adventures in the big city.