SWOT Analysis: Personal Project - Lemon

 For some reason I still felt like something in my design was lacking, I am really struggling to create cute characters at the moment and I'm not sure whether this may be a direct reflection of my mood, as I am having a bit of difficulty due to the Covid-19 pandemic at the moment.

Regardless I have still tried to complete my daily art target, as I want to improve my skills and the only way to do so is with practice, maybe I need to change direction and work on some artwork for my @Parataxic.productions account instead, where the art style and projects can be more random and based around what inspires me at that point in time.

My first attempt at this lemon design felt like it was lacking but I couldn't quite pinpoint exactly what I didn't like about the design? I decided to leave it for a few days before returning to it in order to see if this would help.

ATTEMPT ONE
Strengths:
I really like the overall shape of this design, I feel the placement of highlights is very effective and aesthetically pleasing.

Weaknesses:
The colours and shadow placement make it look a bit like a pie for some reason, and the facial features are quite hard to see which reduces the overall functionality of my design. Perhaps if I were to enlarge the mouth this would help?

Opportunities:
Perhaps if I were to alter the facial expression and add some new areas of interest to distract away from the plain shape of the character it would improve the overall design.

Targets:

• Edit the mouth to make it more prominent within the design
• Add something to the design, perhaps the stars from previous designs to create another point of interest and distract from the simplicity of the shape.
• Perhaps if I were to experiment with the eye shape I could make a much cuter design that I have not really explored, such as having the cheeks push the eyes up.

ATTEMPT TWO

Strengths:

I feel like this facial expression is a lot more effective and much cuter than the original, it just works much better with the shape and placement of the lemon. 

Weaknesses:

I'm not sure the stars had the effect I was aiming for, they look a bit out of place and irrelevant, perhaps they will no longer be needed once I incorporate the leaves into the design.

Opportunities:

I feel this design could be improved dramatically if I were to incorporate some leaves behind one of the outer 'stem' areas. This would help inform the audience what the object is as I was having difficulty making it not look like some sort of pie. 

Targets: 

• Add some leaves behind the left or right side of the character
• Increase the contrast level of the facial features to help them stand out more against the rest of the design as they get a bit lost at the moment.
• Remove star elements