4.02 Create your character
Your character
Use your design skills to add a character sprite and suitable backdrop.
Design means deciding on the way that a project looks and making decisions about what it does.
Open the starter project
Open the Silly eyes starter project. Scratch will open in another browser tab.
Choose your sprite and backdrop
Choose: Add a sprite and a backdrop for your silly eyes project.
- What does your character look like? A person 🧜🏽♀️, animal 🐶 or object 🧸.
- Where do you want your character to live? Somewhere sensible 🏠 or silly 🎪.
Add a sprite from the Sprite Library
Click on Choose a Sprite to open the Sprite Library:
You can search for a sprite, or browse for one by category. Click on a sprite to add it to your project.
Add a backdrop from the Backdrop Library
Click on Choose a Backdrop in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen to open the Backdrop Library:
You can search for a backdrop, or browse for one by category. Click on a backdrop to add it to your project.
Create backdrops and sprites using shapes (Optional)
You can create backdrops and costumes for sprites in the Paint editor, using just shapes.
Go to the Choose a Sprite or Choose a Backdrop menu and choose the Paint option:
Select which tool(s) to use to make the shape(s) that you want:
- Circle: Click on the Circle tool to draw a circle. Press and hold the Shift key on your keyboard to draw a perfect circle.
- Rectangle: Click on the Rectangle tool to draw a rectangle. Press and hold the Shift key to draw a square.
- Triangle: Use the Rectangle tool to draw a rectangle or a square. Click on the Reshape tool and select the corner that you want to remove. Click on the Delete tool to turn your shape into a triangle.
You can use the Fill tool to change the colour of a shape:
You may need to use the Forward and Backward tools to move your shapes forward or backward so that they are positioned correctly within your image:
You can select all the shapes and Group them together so that you can adjust them or move them as one shape:
Here is an example of a sprite created with the Circle and Rectangle tools:
Pig: See inside
Remember to name the costumes and backdrops that you create in the Paint editor.
Get a surprise sprite
Tip: If you create your own sprite in the Paint editor, don’t add eyes yet, because they need to be separate sprites.
Resize your sprite
In the Sprite pane, change the number in the Size property to a number that makes your character fill the Stage.
Look at the Stage. You will see your large character and chosen backdrop.
