Tropicats Behind the Scenes: How Characters are Created

Are you digging your claws into the couch, eager to know what fate has in store for our Tropicats? We have more adventures on the way, but we wanted to take a brief pawse to describe how our favorite felines got their distinct looks.

We met with the talented team behind the artwork in Tropicats and got the details on how they perfectly encapsulate the strong personality of each character. If you thought it was easy— paw-lease!

Where do you get the idea for how a character should look?

Character design starts with a description from the writer that will include the age, job, look, and most importantly the personality of the new character. Our character artist then produces several versions of the new character which are presented to the design team. There’s usually a bit of friendly disagreement at this point, before we move forward with our favorite, and the artist can refine their vision. Getting the facial expressions right is a big part of character design, so we like to jump around the office making silly faces to illustrate exactly what we’re getting at.

And who does all the decorations?

That’ll be our talented artists again. They’re usually themed to something in the story, or to a particular character, which makes coming up with ideas fun. Have you noticed that Elsie’s hut is precisely the same colour as her favourite outfit?

Where do the artists get their inspiration?

With Tropicat Island’s tropical theme thoroughly explored, the team are starting to look to other cultures and countries for inspiration. The Impurrials have a British flavor, for example, with super tidy gardens and a stiff upper lip attitude. Whatever needs imagining, the Tropicat artists always start with ‘character’. Look for meowgical new islands and decorations in the future!

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