What a character wears gives us the first impression of a person while also telling us what and who that person could be. In this tutorial,​ I'll be showing you how to think about to what include when designing the costume for your character to best put across the story you want to tell.

For my character, I am designing a runaway queen. The first questions I'll be asking myself before sketching out ideas are; What should my character be wearing? What condition should the clothes be in? What pose should my character have?

1. Designing The Clothes!

I begin by opening a new document and use the G-pen to draw out my ideas​.

I start with a pose that suggests running and begin to design a dress for my character. I choose an item of inspiration for the design details and for this I chose, a strawberry.

 

After I have a design I like and begin adding other details that I think will help tell the story of the runaway Queen. Because I want to give the impression she has been running through terrain I add a few rips to the bottom and edges of her dress and cuts on her arm and finally, add a crown that falling off to the side.

2. What Colour Should The Costume Be?

I know I want to use the colors red and green because they are the primary colors you see on a strawberry, so I start with these and do variations till I get something that gives off the vibe I'm going for.

To add color, I use the paint bucket tool and create multiple layers naming them after the item I'm coloring; Hair, Skin, Skirt, Collar etc​. I do this so when altering colors I can edit each item individually.

3. Add Some Dirt!

To highlight the impression that she has been running through the terrain, I add dark patches to the bottom of her dress and fingers using the spray brush on a sperate layer on 70% opacity.

Next, I make some color alterations and add in a background with a shadow which I set at 20% Opacity and set to subtract in the layers mode.

4. Dress Details

Because she is a Queen, I want to make sure the quality of her clothing matches, So I add a shine to the material. I do this using the "Running color spray" and add a highlight to the creases and bulges as well as making sure the crown is just as sparkly. Once that's done, I add shadows where needed.

For the next bit, I add highlight and shadows to the hair and skin using the "Lighter pencil" Which is​ a good tool for adding soft adjustments.

5. Final Adjustments!

To finish off, I do a little cleaning up and add red highlights to the cuts on her arm and add a gradient map layer. set too screen mode at 15% which gives the image an overall lighter tone.

There you have it! Your runaway Queen. I hope you enjoyed the tutorial and it has helped you think about what questions to ask when designing the costume for your character.