If a character were to shout, this would give away that they are most likely angry. However, facial expressions are so effective that a mear glance at the character's face is all that is needed to instantly know their mood.
In my opinion, the most important feature of the face are the eyes. The eyes can express almost every emotion under the sun, making it very possible to have a character that is only a pair of floating eyes, and yet still know how they are feeling. The expression "speak with your eyes" comes to mind.
The character Scrat from the Ice Age films is my favourite character, despite him not saying a word in the entire series. This is down to his expressive personality. The animators have done a brilliant job at conveying his hyperactive movements. His massive eyes also make it very easy to identify his feelings, and also make it possible to easily express any type of mood. This character has actually inspired me with my own character, which I will go over in a later post.
Another character that has greatly inspired me with facial expressions is Zim from the cartoon Invader Zim. This used to be one of my favourite cartoons when I was younger, and I have always remembered how expressive the character's eyes were. Usually when you think of someone with a normal, relaxed expression on their face, you would think that their eyes would be almost completely open. It was extremely rare for Zim to ever have both of his eyes completely open at any one time. He would usually have at least one of his eyes very slightly closed, to give him a more suspicious/plotting expression.
Once again, the animators did a fantastic job with facial expressions in this cartoon because the character's eyes were always moving. Even cutting off a very slight bit of the top of the eye formed an entirely new expression. I want to use this technique with my character in order to give a constant expression of his feelings.
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