Animation Source Forums

I decided to adapt my originally Spirit Source character guide to Lion King. Here we go:


Before you start: Ask yourself some questions: Do you really want a new character? Do you need it? Do you have anything to do with it? Do you have any ideas for it? Character making is not a competition. It's better to have less, but better characters than a whole buch of unused cliches.

Starting: I don't recommend starting from a design. Most of the time it would end as undeveloped, rushed character with no bigger purpose. At first think about character's story, personality, relations etc. Take your time. If you develop a character, you'll eventually be able to choose a fitting design or "adopt" or request an one.

Story: Don't go Mary-sue here. There are some really overused and boring plots (you can read many of those advises in anti-sue topics). Be original and accurate. If you're going to make some story twists - give them a context and explanation. If some characters are going to act a certain way - explain why (For exaple Scar killed Mufasa. Why?). Even "evil" characters need their reasons. Do not try to copy movie events ("Chased off by his eliv uncle, lived in the jungle" etc.), it's boring and not creative.


Movie and history accuracy:
Names - Keep the names simple and acurate to time and reality (don't go Radioactive Rayban for a wild animal). Animals don't have surnames neither. They can have titles (Alexander The Great, Eric The Red etc.) but they don't have super long, fancy familly names (like Roderic B. LaRosa, Hans Von Heidenberg). This is very stupid and lame way to make your characters unique. There are many other ways to make your character good and unique instead of giving them unbelievable names, unable to read, write and prounce. Most of Liion King characters have their names in Swahili or other African language.
*Character abilities and look - There are no overpowered, magical creatures in TLK. Your characters won't have any magical, unusual powers. There are only spirits, but they don't really interact with characters. It's very easy to cross the line of what's acceptable and accurate. Cut off any weird decorations on your lions. Your character definitely won't wear any fancy gems, necklaces and belts.
*Places, factions, behaviours - Don't stick witn only few places shown in movie. Africa is large and wide, and Pridelands, Outlands or jungle aren't the only places there.

Design & breed:
Your character needs to have some believable breed and design. Since the story is about lions, you character can be one of the existing lion species, the most common being East African Lion. Extinct species are not allowed, including Barbary and Cape lions. Make a research before creating other big cats, especially for the fact if the said species lies in Africa. Hybrids are very rare.
Your designs don't have to be super complicated and detailed. Good/complicated design does not equal a good character and for an animated movie, where designs are rather simplified, a simple, clean design is perfectly okay. Base your designs on real-life lions and you'll see how nice markings&colour combinations you can come up with. Keep in mind that some colorations, like albino are very rare and it's not good when several people suddenly come up with white lions to be "original".
Lions in TLK have diferent shapes and mane styles and this is also a part of character designs. Not all your lionesses need to look like Nala and not all your lions need to look like Simba. There's a difference between Simba, Mufasa and Kovu, Scar etc. There's also a difference between Sarabi, Vitani or Kiara. Consider those different face shapes while designing your character. And most of all don't use different character bases for the same character! Even if you change colours or nose, Kovu does NOT look like Simba.

Movie relation:
This has been said many times before. This is a fan site and you are creating a fan character. Your character HAS to be TLK related. However, it doesn't mean it has to be blood-related to any official characters himself or that it even has to be a lion. There are many ways that you can relate your character with either movie events or characters. Your character can be a friend, enemy, mentor, adopted child, a friend to your other fan character. As long as your characters have good, believable relation, they can be birds, hyenas, leopards, elephants, crocodiles etc. Be creative!
Living in the same place is NOT a movie relation


Character creating is not a competition. Nobody is rushing you so make sure your bio has all the needed info and everything you want to contain about your character when youare posting it to the site.


Useful links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion - Wikipedia page about lions.
http://www.springhole.net/writing/marysue.htm - Mary sue/Gary Stu test
https://translate.google.com/ - Google translator contains Swahili and Zulu.
http://rakpolaris.deviantart.com/art/Mu ... -318362830 - tutorial with differences between Mufasa and Simba
http://jasminehopkins.deviantart.com/ar ... -143518599 - Tutorial with lion King characters eyes stylization
/lion_kin ... display=18 - common Lion King character design traits

Good guide, Troll.

However, may I make a suggestion: When it comes to characters names, (and since, as you said, Africa is a pretty big place) they should be primarily in African languages, whether it's Swahili, Kenya, Luo, etc. Believe me, there are a ton of name choices in those selected languages. But East Africa doesn't just consist of those three.

All it takes is a bit of research, and one of the things I learned is what makes either a good character or a bad character is when their personality matches their names, it makes for a more conflicting and interesting story.