12 Principles of Animation: Appeal, or Character Personality

Appeal - Differentiation in character design

The technique of appeal is all about charisma and how pleasing to look at characters are. By using appeal, a character's design should appear more interesting and fascinating so that it grasps the attention of the audience. Animators have adapted this technique and in order to embrace the appeal of a character, certain aspects that define a character's principal personality are magnified, and in doing so the design of the character becomes more compelling. Furthermore, appeal is not centralized only on the protagonist or antagonist, but on all characters so that a versatility of appearance is established. For example, animators often play around with the contour shapes of different characters, making the overall characters differentiate in a visual appeal. In this manner none of the characters will be considered tedious or boring from a visual perspective, hence they all have a unique trait in their design. However, adding too much detail might decrease the visual appeal of a character by overcomplicating his design, rendering him difficult to follow.

Spongebob Squarepants: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zerpQcrgVnc

All characters follow a different design, making them appealing to the audience.