Chayne is the only pure human among the main characters of Freak Show.
He is an activist who fights for trans-humans’ rights, so for a time I had considered making him like some stereotipical, cartoony “I go to all the protests and I don’t eat food which had a face” kind of person.
Then I decided against it.

This is the first page I made, a while ago.

I had no strong feelings towards any of them, so John picked up the youngest one.
I think his genuine look is fitting for an idealist, and I’m quite happy with the veil of innocence and ingenuity in his face.

Once we agreed on a general look, I made some full figure studies.
His clothes are consistent with the look I devised for the generic population, with the only difference that Chayne wouldn’t wear any head gear.

In purists worlds people would normally cover their head as a sign of modesty, and as a rebel I figure Chayne would not want to conform to that idea.

Also, I have to confess that I didn’t fancy one of the main characters to be wearing a hat that would make him look like the modern equivalent of a medieval farmer.
Anyway, here are some studies for Chayne.

We picked the first from the left, but don’t mind his face.
I made a few more experiments on this round of sketches, but his official look is still that of the young guy from page one.

Now I’m *this close* (makes gesture with thumb and index drawing close) to starting with the panels.
I just need to finalize a secondary character and some security guards, then I’m ready to go.

So you’ll be seeing a few more concepts over the next days.

by Paolo Puggioni