Going back to designing movie creatures and characters

One case study in this book has particularly caught my attention as there are crucial differences between this example and how I have decided to carry out my character development. Spectral motion, formed by Mike Elizalde started up through a career change from the navy into makeup for the Dave Miller studio. Mike explains how the film An American Werewolf in London (1981) and the book, Techniques of three dimensional makeup by Lee Baygan were his initial inspiration. Where as I had believed that film production teams are usually split into different, specialist groups, Mike had to cover many aspects of modelmaking, including sculpting, molding, casting and painting. Here is what he has to say on the character design process;
"If you're designing or sculpting characters, everyone has some input and you're essentially piecing together someone else's ideas."

When he moved more into the film industry, another crucial influence to his characters was the actor who would be playing them. As I will not have cyberscans of people to work from, I feel my character will be best suited for an animated film. I could reference an existing animated feature's style used at the end of A Series Of Unfortunate Events film for continuality.

Another interesting storey is that of Patrick Tatopoulos, starting as an illustrator in Greece before sending clay models to American film companys. Working at MEG, Makeup effects Group he progressed from making molds to designing characters for Star Trek, The next generation TV series. He describes how he works as follows:
"When I'm asked to design a character, all I need to do is read the script. Then I sit and draw. To be a good designer I think you need a wealth of knowldege about artisic and cultural styles, about biology, anatomy and different types of animals. You are constantly observing these things. Then, when you draw, you don't need to think about these things, they will inform your work almost instinctivly."