I still needed to make them periodically accurate and fit with the rest f the characters and their level of detail and appeal. The first design here was taken from a research image where I loved the folded and pleated ruffle at the front of the dress. It was a lovely design feature that I felt lifted the whole design. I was also trying to get a corset feel as corsets and basques were vey popular at the time and gave that classic Victorian figure with a small waist which would thrust out into hips and then the large billowing dresses. The second design tries to capture this with it's "buttress" structure. I wanted to get this nice sense of draped layered material and was aiming to recreate this on a simpler level using shapes and different textures of line. I feel the top needs a lot of work but my main focus here was the detail level of the bottom which I feel I have achieved. My third design on this page was a reworked version of the base mother design. I decided to push the size of the waist and then have this contrast the outward bloom of the dress and start to flesh out some more intricate and delicate features such as the arm and shoulder details, wrist elements etc. I think the subtle details like this will really eli my film to establish its visual grounds and appeal.
The next design is a different little girl. i saw a picture during the collection of my research that I really got inspired by with a bit of a nautical feel and I wanted to capture that cute quality. I feel like i captured that quality quite nicely but at the end of it I felt like having more little girls in the piece would draw attention away from my main protagonist. I also felt that the mariner theme and the structured ow took away from the victorian elements I had established with my other characters. The next design was a focus into the costume. I really liked this central decoration element and then having that continued in the long flowing ribbons that added a nice element the dress design. I also liked the long train that trails off the end of the dress that is a nice call back to earlier research that I liked. It has a nice mix of rich and poor and is perhaps plainer than most but this level of variety was something I was after in this environment. This last design is my favourite of them all. I really loved the nice ruffled layering of the dress that pulls it up at the booth to reveal yet another layer that is more pleated which gives it a nice variety of material and style. I also liked the ruffled bow and material element on the back of the dress. I also liked the juxtaposition of this detail and complexity with the simpler feel of the torso and corset which is more one material and structured. The final touch of the non net gives her a varied feel and what makes her an older character as she doesn't had the same extravagance of the larger and more elaborate hats.
Another design feature I really liked here was the criss cross material section of the dress in the top right. I liked the detail level. I also really liked the half cape and would like to perhaps take this into another design for another character. I am also fond of the three blue designs which were an attempt at a poorer dress and I feel like this could be a good basis for the gardeners design. I especially love the nice floppy bow that featured so heavily in my research.
