Wednesday 24 August 2011

Life Form Concept Refinement, Part 1

I settled on #20 to take forward, simply because of the legs. I'm quite un-focussed at the moment as I have lots of ideas for what I could do with the shape, but I can't seem to settle on one. Furthermore, this is your first introduction to my dreadful handwriting.

Starting with a larger sketch of the shape for reference, and playing with rotations and possible stretching of the shape. Nothing groundbreaking, just laying some foundations.

Here I'm beginning to think about habitat and locomotion - I noticed the legs could potentially be wings or flippers. I am very fond of the idea of the creature as being aquatic, but all my designs for it end up looking too much like typical plesiosaurs. I also began experimenting with the head shape - I feel like I should keep the head small and understated to draw attention to the limbs, and strong curves and angles definitely aren't working for that.

And investigating possible textures - thick, mammoth-like fur on a terrestrial creature was ruled out because it obscured the leg shapes too much. I also looked at possible fur for a marine creature - namely thick, dense fur like a sea otter's, hairlessness, walrus-like bristles or very short fur like a seal's. As I still haven't decided on whether I want the creature to be land- or seabound, I won't be making any decisions about that just yet.

More wrestling with the face, along with stumbling upon a possible idea for a 'crest' around the jaw echoing the leg shapes. Perhaps it could only appear on males, sort of like a deer's antlers. Also trying out potential body shapes for a waterborne creature, trying to break away from the typical sea-monster/plesiosaur. I'm not terribly fond of any of them, but they're a start.

Input would be much appreciated, even if it's only 'flip a coin, heads it's terrestrial, tails it's waterborne'.

1 comment:

  1. Some input, Meg! I REALLY like the body-shape of the drawing in the top right of the first page, and your logic associated with gorillas and mammoths; the underwater animals end up coming across as a bit, well generic - as you rightly point out. I like the idea too of it being shaggy - I'm sort of reminded of the costumes of Nick Cave:

    http://ucarochester-cgartsandanimation.blogspot.com/2011/06/supplement-nick-cave.html

    and also

    http://www.worldwildlife.org/gift-center/Images/large-species-photo/large-three-toed-sloth-photo.jpg

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