Progressing to 3D

In the last two weeks my already slower than average work production has suffered further due to my indecision about how to progress to 3D. I am very entrenched in my routine of working on pencil drawings (that are always, regardless of how much i try to avoid it, controlled as opposed to abstract, free, or messy), and have always found it difficult to progress from this stage. This tells me that I'm starting in the wrong place, but hey, it's been started now...

I am beginning to feel that my initial ideas of 'stage sets' are rather limiting. I accept certain of the limitations of my initial ideas, the main one being that it is unlikely that i will be able to make every element of my final 7 'sets' 3D - . I cannot predict whether that will remain true, but I will cross that bridge when I come to it. The other thing is that i do not have the time to create very detailed, realistic 'scenery', which in any case I wouldn't want to do. The issue I'm considering (and all this before I've even started) is the way the 2D elements - likely to be the characters - and the 3D elements - likely to be the scenery - work together.

What I am able to do , however, is look at more inventive ways of constructing each 'set' in 3D.

First Visuals

These are my first character attempts. I am beginning with these because a children's book is centered on its characters, and they need to be consistent and expressive. I have to say I'm astounded at how bad my drawing skills have become all of these took me at least three attempts to get even nearly right.

Lettering Research

I would like to have the title of each chapter suspended in the box as part of the image. This will help to give it some form of anchorage. Even if I don't end up using it in the 3D image, the lettering will definitely be useful elsewhere. I came across this dutch-style font and thought it could be good as a starting point - for inspiration.