Little three to five part (patreon exclusive) series I plan on doing over the next couple days. Mainly breaking down some of my process work.
To start, the most important thing in my opinion, is the outfit. I'll usually begin with the setting then outfit before the guns or actual character design. Gives you a basis of what kind of look and equipment the actual person will have. For this one I used a more winter themed with the recent weather. Breaking it down even further it helps to do it layer by layer. So my first layers will always be a skinsuit.
Tight, sleek and secure thermals keep up this idea of modern/tactical while keeping the elements out. Like skinsuits when diving in cold waters. What enhances this though is throwing on traditional gear/clothing. A bomber jacket, webbings and equipment bulk up the profile of the character and turns it into a well equipped look. Skinsuits are interesting cause you're really drawing the full nude body of these characters. Of course that's to certain extents like in MGS1 it's more bulky and plated with armor while in GITS (Movie) It's akin to basically nudity.
Either way it gives another layer of texture and colors for your design to pop. Layers are important for contrasting all the high tech harnesses, gear and weapons they'll be carrying. Dull Blues and Grays for the rubber material of high tech skinsuits while multi colored camos on plain matt fabrics.
Below to give a little example of what I mean, the non-skinsuit and bionic parts I poche show the how it can help make the curves of the body pop out.
Of course if you want to go even further some real life examples like Danish and Northern European soldiers provide ponchos and cloaks for their soldiers. I'm not too worried about realism in my drawings but if you go that route it's a nice detail to add. Plus it gives a flange of mystery and coolness to the uniform. (Also from a drawing process it makes it a hell of a lot easier to draw.)
Of course that's not the only layers with armor and webbing for the magazines and equipment go on top of that. I never liked standard plate carriers, the basic ones with a front and back plate I mean. So to keep it simple and still incorporate that natural figure I tend to mold and layer the armor like scales of a lobster. You see this in WW1 armor a lot. I find it extremely fitting to the setting and also easy to draw. Remember not everything has to be complicated to be interesting.
To top it off the webbing and harness I do are usually a bit more on the bulky side. I think it grounds the look and doesn't go into that territory of a spacer look. As mentioned before MGS1 excels in this. tight around the muscles but just a little baggy in some areas, with a bulky armor vest and mundane pouches/straps to wrap it up.
Now the signature of a lot of my pieces being the headset/visor. I'm not opposed to helmets but they tend to look more Halo like if not done right. Which is not the kind of vibe I'm trying to go for in these. In cyberpunk settings most people usually have a metal plate in their head already, or their helmets have no glass portion for the visor which I think works best. Tiny dots for micro cameras and multiple edges for that aggressive look. It's a certain look that gives a lot more open design and you don't have to worry about "I need this oblong slice taken out of my helmet"
For the Visors this is my basic go to. It's a bit of a blank canvas but that leads me to add more cameras, optics and customization to it. I use to make these pretty bulky like actual vr sets. but slimmed down like below fits a lot more within the setting. Of course I can add a helmet with this setup and more too.
To sum up; design by layers of clothing & don't overcomplicate things. Your setting will give you a lot of info on the clothes they'll need & Cyberpunk/tactical settings like this work best with contrast. That's gonna be the thing people see first when looking at your tactical goons or cute eastern European anime women with chopped up guns.
I'll be going over guns and other equipment tomorrow. I have only 3 weeks left in Europe so thankfully I'll be able to work in my traditional conditions around mid December.