Redefining My Character

Recently, I have been working to develop a clear concept of the character that I am going to create for my project. At first I was just trying to jump into starting the modeling, but I realized that I was having trouble really visualizing who my character is and what they are supposed to be about. Usually before designing a character I have a somewhat clear idea of who they are, their history, and their personality. But for whatever reason I have been struggling to come up with something for this project.  I had done some research on a style that I thought I wanted to follow and came up with the following sketches.

 I had decided to do the design in the middle and even came up with some T-poses to base my model off of.

 But after trying to start the model and doing a little over an hour of work on it, I realized I wasn't feeling any attachment to the design or really even drawn to it at all. There's something special that happens when you're trying to create a character that you really care about, and I realized that what ever that is was missing.  Now some people might argue that it's not important that you feel attached to what ever you are making, but I've found that when you have that special connection the love and care you put into the creation really does show through in the end result. If you don't care about your character, then it's likely no one else will either.

I decided to check out a video on character design called, "Character Design Pipeline: Production Art & Research Techniques with Barontieri." After trying some of  Barontieri's exercises for how he develops his characters, I realized I was right about not having a clear idea of who my character was.

I had developed new character thumbs that were entirely different from my first ones, which to me, really proved that I didn't have a clear and cohesive idea for what I was trying to accomplish. And it has become all the more evident that I really need to sit down and flesh out a clear concept and guidelines for what I want to do.

Now that I have returned to the drawing board, I have decided to take things a little slower. Before even trying to design the character visually, I need to design them emotionally.
I need to know:
Who is it that I am trying to make? What are they like? What's their personality? What do they do? What are they good at? What kind of world do they live in?

For all of these things I need to first find references. Which is why I have been putting together some rough style sheets.

Next I want to make one for the setting and then hopefully I'll be able to put together a clear character bio. I'd like to have this all done by tomorrow so that I can restart designing the look and feel of my character.