Unusual Suspects: The Characters of Yao Yao

Working out of Shenzhen, China, game designer and art director Yao Yao has produced a broad catalog of vivid character designs in her distinct illustration style. Her art features a straightforward, bright palette and clean, caricatured silhouettes. I am very excited to share it with you.

Yao’s post-anime style perfectly marries playful cartoonishness with design tropes of more ‘serious’ Sci-Fi and Fantasy. There is an exciting strangeness to her designs.

A space marine twins his over-sized laser pistol with day-glo thigh-high boots and a jauntily tilted disk of glass as a hat.

Eastern gods re-imagined as robotic warriors.

Shadowy woodland tribespeople so encased in masks and living plants that it is uncertain where their bodies begin and the flora ends.

Here are a few more of my favorites from her gallery:

Check out her page on Behance to see even more of Yao Yao’s exquisite work.