The Importance of Silhouettes

Practicing Character Silhouettes 

In competitive multiplayer games, it is sometimes important to be able to identify other players against the scenery quickly. It is essential for, some types of games, that information such as player team, class, weapon, and rank must be quickly identified for the player to make quick decisions.  

When designing characters, certain design elements must be prioritized in an order in which the player reads them.The silhouette of a character is the predominant element when identifying a character at range. Through the use of unique and contrasting outlines, the player can extract much information from the character.

I created my own character silhouettes today, trying my best to create unique and varying styles of character, and linking them with similar design elements. The top three have robotic elements to them which make them seem like they belong together. The bottom two, however, did not feel as if they belonged with the rest as they felt too human and chunky which is why I separated them from the rest. Overall, I am pretty happy with the results but there is still a lot of room for improvement.