The Importance of Reference

If there's one thing I have to emphasise, and emphasise again, it's the importance of using visual reference when you're designing.

Lose the ego, you're not as creative as you think you are, you're not going to be able to pull an entire world out of your head (or ass). Sure, you have a blurry general idea of what your world looks like and what its aesthetic is, but that's all it is; a suggestion of a design.

You've got to nail this shit to the floor, bro.

Exhibit A: The dog.

It's not a bad design of a dog, per se; it's just... unremarkable. It's the idea of a dog, jotted down on paper. You think dog, you think of that particular shape. There is nothing about it that really defines it as one particular breed or another. It's good for laying out the kind of design you want sort-of, but not much else.

And here it is, improved. Using reference of the Xolotl dog, the lines are more confident, and it's been given more of a defined shape; it's a far more solid design, because it has anchors in reality. What I was going for in the previous design is now realised; a mangy, malnourished, thick-necked fighting dog. This is my final design for the dog.

Exhibit B: The camel.

Again, the general outline of what I want is here; a bachrian camel. All of what will make the final camel design stand out is here; hair over the eyes, big curvy neck, puffy front shoulders, high hips...

With referece, the whole thing still works, except now it is exponentially better looking!

If you are going to design without reference, let that never be your final design for that character/item/layout/whathaveyou. Caricaturing from a general idea is good for figuring out what will make that character/item/layout/whathaveyou special and stand out, but it must never be the definitive.