Character Redesign #4: Sonic the Hedgehog

If you've been keeping up with my blog thus far, you'll remember that post about bad character designs where I basically tore into the current design of SEGA's spiny blue mascot. Well, as my current project revolves around taking iconic characters and changing them, I saw this as a perfect opportunity to right this particular wrong.

As with Mario, Sonic is a character everyone recognises; he's a blue, cartoon hedgehog who can run insanely fast and whose trademark moves involve his spin-dash (i.e, curling up and spinning) and running around loops. He spends most of his games thwarting the plans of his nemesis, Dr. Robotnik (I refuse to call him Eggman...).

Image Source: http://www.sonicstadium.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Sonic-Generations-artwork.jpg

I believe I covered exactly what is wrong with Sonic's current design in my previous post; his spines are too long and floppy and he's too lanky by half. However, these flaws aside, his overall design is actually pretty iconic, with his most recognisable traits being the blue, curved spines, as well as his signature red shoes.

Design sketches for Sonic's redesign

One of the main goals with the redesign was to make Sonic appear more like an actual hedgehog (because let's be honest, his current design barely look like one). That being said, I originally wanted a much more conservative design, as the sketches on the left show. However, I was eventually tried something more like an actual hedgehog, resulting in the design below.

Here's the first version of Sonic's redesign. Truth be told, I wasn't 100% happy with how this turned out (the 'realistic fur didn't look right to me) and I eventually did an altogether different variation

...Which, you'll see on my next post. Sorry, but this one's getting too long as it is.