One thing I see often in VN dev communities and game dev in general is people wanting to develop their own games, but struggling with design and drawing. And let me get one thing straight - if you want a detailed, elaborate and uniquely designed art, you need to hire an artist. But what if you are just getting your feet wet in the game development world and you don't wanna fully commit yet and spend hundreds of dollars right away? Well, in this case, I might have something for you.

I am not really an artist. I draw when I need to and have learned to wing it but that's about it. I make many mistakes in my art but I've also launched my RenPy Character Creator and RenPy Main Menu template, which I believe look pretty enough to trick an untrained eye into thinking I know what I'm doing when it comes to art.

So let me tell you how I did it...

But first, as I said, I'm not an artist but I do have some things helping me produce decent art. Let's get the facts out of the way:

• I do have some design background... with buildings. I'm an interior design major.
• I have some drawing skills but not from memory. Boy, oh, boy, definitely not from memory.
• I have the One by Wacom drawing tablet, which is legit the least expensive drawing tablet from a not scam-y looking company, and it is my baby, my precious, my ride or die... Ok, on a serious note, if you plan to produce any digital art, I strongly recommend getting any drawing tablet and start using it in place of a mouse as much as possible to get used to it. It is a game changer.

How do I draw my characters?

Ok, let me give you my secret... It's called "fashion croquis". 

There are many fashion students and designers out there who need a base to draw their outfits on, so they don't waste time on fruitless tasks and those are the bases they use. You can also have some luck searching for "male template" and "female template". What you will find is numerous full-body outlines in different poses and even in different body types, many of which are free to use as you wish.

That's how I created the characters for my RenPy Character Creator. I took a template I liked and traced over it with a line art brush that was suitable for the style I was going for.

Since the fashion templates are exaggerated, I made her a bit wider and a bit shorter to look more like a real human being. For the male character, I Frankenstein-ed a couple of different templates together.

What about the outfits, though?

Honestly, I would strongly suggest drawing them on your base by using images only as a reference so they look stylized to your world, and not some abomination of photo realism and sketchy lines. However... If you've tried this and you're certain there is no way to make it work, there is another option:

• Download images of clothes (not flat lay but worn by someone).
• Erase anything but the piece of clothing you wish to use from the picture. 
• Put it over your base (you might need to give it some transparency or multiply to see underneath it)
• Shape it with the Liquify tool
• Trace over it

Would that give you great outfits? No... No, it would not. But would it give you workable outfits for a quick experimental project, or placeholders, or a game jam? Yes, I believe so.

For better results, use the same brush for all your art outlines and if the program allows it - make the settings to smooth, so the program fixes small vibrations. If you're not used to making clean lines, you should use all the help that's there for you. Worry about having more details to your art later.

This Doesn't Work For You?

If this isn't what you're looking for, there is another approach I used to illustrate my Demo: Mark of the Past that would give you a much different art style. I have explained it in my "How Did I Successfully Make a Game The Wrong Way?" Devlog, along with some background tips and tricks.