Character Redesign: The Old Man and the Sea

These were done for a class assignment in which we had to read and redesign the main characters, Manolin and Santiago, from tHemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea" to a fantasy or science-fiction setting.

I chose to genderbend the characters, and though the other elements aren't yet apparent (the assignment hasn't been done yet) also made them into sky fishermen, hence why the Santiago character is holding a bird rather than a fish. The "fish" Santiago will eventually catch is a sky dragon and the boat flies through the sky.

This is also why I gave heavy coats; Even though the skirts and headdresses denote that they aren't necessarily from an arctic environment themselves, the coats are needed for high-altitude sailing.

The next step for these is to color them and put patterns on Manolin's skirt and headdress and refine the birds/birdcage but for the time being I am calling them done and am excited to show what I have :)

These were done entirely digital in Photoshop with a tablet. While they're still not perfect in many ways, I consider this to be by "Bedb" of digital work; an opening of doors, so to speak, of what I am actually capable of.