#019
Today is in between Fat Tuesday and Valentine’s Day. Happy Fatuesentinesday!
You might notice that Skunk Kid looks a little different from her earlier appearances in the comic. I was drawing her in my sketchbook a few weeks ago and I was feeling really underwhelmed with her design. I thought the black/white interplay was cool enough when I created her, but she didn’t even have a mouth. She really only had one expression. I could modify it a bit by adding some eyebrows, but that was all. (Actually, a LOT of my characters don’t have mouths. I’m gonna try to keep that in mind moving forward — but I don’t plan on redesigning any other characters right now. You won’t see Octopus Kid with a big grin.)
Anyway, here’s the sketchbook page where I was kinda like, “Hey, what if she had a mouth?” You can see that I circled one drawing because I liked the small mouth, rounded ears, and more expressive eyes. They gave her more personality.
Below is the backside of that first page. Once I had the basis for the idea, I decided to sketch her a few more times. (To the right, I was also trying to write D.K.’s valentine. Don’t be weirded out by “i lick you”; if you’ve ever read anything written by a young kid, you know that they’re highly likely to spell “like” as “lick.” Still, I decided the joke might be read as too suggestive.)
Thanks for reading. I hope you like Skunk Kid’s new look.
This is so cute! I love the update on Skunk Kid.
Did you try using her snout and nose to show emotion before she had a mouth?
Not really. The snout and nose were solid black, and they’re a rigid shape. I think it’d be a different cartoon style if her snout started drooping or perking up or other weird transformations.
This would not be the case for pachydermous aardvark creatures with upside-down nosebleeds. (If you ever change your icon, this reply will look very strange.)