Hackberry Hollow

Hackberry Hollow has been interesting to design because we have animal people, animal animals, and undead versions of each. So not only do I need to design an interesting look for the fluffy characters, but the not-so-fluffy as well.

The undead in the story are performing characters so they need to be easier to read than a “realistic” skeleton (I use the term loosely because skeletons don’t talk or move on their own for that matter). I started out with giving the skeleton some more mass and made the skull bigger. Then I simplified, removing a lot of the minor details, and made the bones curvy and more appealing.

I can try some other things, like really pushing the skeletons to look more angular or cartoony, but that’s for later.

One of the big reasons why I wanted to tackle the undead design is because I wanted to visualize  one of the ways necromancers in the comic disguise or camouflage their undead. There are 3 ways to do this. This blog post is showing the second one, covering it with cloth to hide the green glow of the undead skeleton. Even the eyes are covered, hiding the brightest part of the undead. And you can put whatever you want to in front of the eyes. The undead can see just fine.