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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:35 AM
Hi all,

I thought I would share with you this tutorial I did for 3dtotal.
This is a low rez version of the book one (digital painting techniques volume 1) which you can purchase here ;)

https://shop.3dtotal.com/product_info.php?products_id=337


Gathering Informations:

First of all, let’s try to find real animals that could live in this very specific environment condition. It’s always good to reference nature, and it’s the best source of inspiration to me.
The higher the altitude, the lower the pressure and atmosphere should become. Existing animals that live in high mountains, like Llamas or Deer Mice have adapted their physiology to survive in those extreme conditions.
This could be a good starting point to find design ideas for our creature.

Here is a website where I found some interesting informations:

http://www.bio.davidson.edu/Courses/anphys/1999/Dickens/Dickens.htm

Those animals have to get more oxygen in blood to transfer it to tissues. This means for our creature that it could have a REDISH SKIN
They also need less food. Our creature could be SKINNY
The depth of respiration increases. This means it could have a BIG RIB CAGE
“Pressure in pulmonary arteries is increased, "forcing" blood into portions of the lung which are normally not used during sea level breathing.
The body produces more red blood cells to carry oxygen,
The body produces more of a particular enzyme that facilitates the release of oxygen from hemoglobin to the body tissues.”

For humans, high altitude can cause some dangerous side effects which can also give us ideas for the design :
Headache, dizziness, fatigue, shortness of breath, loss of appetite, nausea, disturbed sleep, and a general feeling of malaise. HAPE results from fluid buildup in the lungs. Let’s add Holes on the rib cage.

HACE is the result of swelling of brain tissue from fluid leakage. The creature will also have holes on the HEAD TO EVACUATE FLUIDS.
We should consider adding BIG NOSTRILS on it to get more air in the lungs, and so more oxygen as well.

We could possibly add nostrils all over the body. He will also have2 necks, to double the volume of air coming from the nostrils on the head.



The name I chose is Pterocephalys . “Ptero” means flying and “cephalys” is referring to cephal, big head.

Most of the time where the atmosphere is low on a planet, the gravity is also low. Our creature could be adapted to this condition as well. He could be jumping very high in the sky and fly using membranes just like the flying squirrels. The Pterocephalys will need strong thigh muscles to be able to do that.

I am going to use Painter X, and a wacom tablet intuos 3 to draw this creature. Let's do a very quick sketch of this creature and see how it could move.

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It gives us an indication on the proportions of the Pterocephalys. It could be between a bird and a squirrel for the legs.

PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:36 AM
Let's draw a first quick sketch just to get started with global shapes and proportions. Sometimes I scan a traditional sketch done with a pencil and put color on it with Painter. In this case I will start directly in Painter using the pencil brush. The Pterocephalys will be able to walk and jump but he will not be a good runner at all!

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:36 AM
I am refining the sketch a little bit. Here I am focusing on the head a little bit more. I have added holes on the head. Those holes’ purpose is to evacuate the liquid that could cause a cerebral oedema. Huge nostrils and smaller ones were added on the face. I am also adding a quick rock to make me think about the environment as well.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:36 AM
Here I am adding rough colours and re using rocks from a photo I took in New Zealand, to get a sense of the lighting and environment. This rock was actually a small one but it is a good base for a paint over.
I am using 3 layers at this stage (character/rocks/sky). I used Painter's airbrush for the sky and the round oil pastel with low opacity to add colour over the character. If we look at the rocks lighting, the main light which is the sun is coming from behind and we also get an ambient blue light coming from the sky.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:37 AM
I want to focus again on the head to help me figuring out this character’s personality. I don’t want him to look too aggressive as he doesn’t need to eat very often. He is not a predator and just need to eat some rare flowers once a week.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:37 AM
I am pretty much detailing the body by going down the neck and rib cage. I am mainly using the oil pastel for details and the airbrush to get more of the volumes. I want this creature to have holes all over the body and a fleshy feel to the skin. It has to be skinny also, as mentioned previously. I am using featherless chicken and furless cats photos as reference, to get ideas about skin rendering and skin folds.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:37 AM
Now let's work on the lower body area.I need to re work the lines to get a clearer idea of his anatomy before adding details. I could have focused on the lines first and just do a black and white first pass on the whole thing, but I am more used to play with the colours very early in the process.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:37 AM
Here I am adding volume and details to the legs using the same tools, and also the glow tool to get a warmer sun highlight color.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:38 AM
Now I am painting over the rock photo so that it blends more with the rest of the drawing, and aslo to be able to tweak it more easily eventually.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:38 AM
Here I am just adding shadows under the feet, and details on the lower part of the body. Cerebral fluid has also been added. It is kind of floating in the air because of the low gravity.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:38 AM
Now let’s focus on the highlights and the second neck shape: Because this creature has holes all over his body to evacuate liquids, it makes sense to add more of a wet skin shading on it. Also the neck shape was a bit too straight, and it was not looking organic enough, so I changed it a little bit. This creatures has so many holes on it hat I wanted the lower neck to look almost like an external organ.
This makes him look a little bit more fragile, but it’s ok as he is able to escape pretty much all dangers by jumping very high.

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:38 AM
Final image: I have cropped the image so that we get a closer look on
the creature. I also removed some rocks underneath the screen right
knee. The middle toes are now smaller to brake the uniform and rather
boring proportions.
I finally added more contrast to the image and that's it!

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PascalR
16-01-2010, 10:39 AM
References: Here are some photos I found on the internet that I kept in mind while drawing this creature. I did not re used them directly in the painting as a matte painter would usually do (except for the rock), but I found them inspiring for this particular creature design.

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Billabong
16-01-2010, 11:49 AM
Really great tutorial Pascal. Thanks so much for sharing

-B

Tomaya
16-01-2010, 12:23 PM
Awsome pascal , and that's YOUR style dude !

PascalR
16-01-2010, 01:33 PM
Thanks guys, I am glad you like it. It's been a real exercice for me to think about the environment where that creatures would live in the first place , and then only see how it could look like.:rofl:

Cheers!

cj3d
16-01-2010, 09:02 PM
neato :D This is really helpful and quite inspiring....and creepy! That's a good thing of course.

CJ

PaulAdams
17-01-2010, 12:43 AM
Crikey, those references images are scary enough.....eeek.

Beautifully renderered creature, you nailed that SSS look. Thanks for sharing!

Manki
17-01-2010, 05:04 AM
Awesome Pascal !!! :bouncy:
Thanx a lot !!!

Lorenzana
17-01-2010, 08:41 AM
Amazing concept Pascal, the idea of cerebral evacuation is really unhealthy and that´s the reason of his originality, the Pterocephalys really works in his own low atmosphere ecosystem, but I´m not sure about his life expentacy out there.
In my personal opinion I´ll put some translucent membranes between the big 2 necks hole...
Thanks a lot for sharing.

sebcravoisier
18-01-2010, 06:19 AM
i love you style ! pascal!

Porkpie Samurai
18-01-2010, 01:10 PM
gorgeous work Pascal, such a unique and interesting style.

Ken
18-01-2010, 03:26 PM
Great tutorial, Pascal. I also love your style! looking forward to seeing the finishing work. Thank you for sharing :)

tonytrout
18-01-2010, 10:04 PM
Pascal Thanks for sharing your technique :thumbsup:

southern
27-01-2010, 09:52 PM
Excellent thread. I've learned loads just looking at the images. Great tutorial and use of lighting.

PascalR
27-01-2010, 10:39 PM
Cheers guys, I am glad you liked this short tut:rofl:
:welcome: Glen, great to have you on board!

southern
28-01-2010, 01:50 AM
Thanks for the invite Pascal. It looks like you have a very talented crowd in the forum already. I know a lot of the names by their work or CV's...lots of right-click-save-as eyecandyness

I've gotta get round to getting down to New Zealand before I die. The place is just chock full of digital talent now. Would it be possible to fly my studio down there do you think!...lol

PascalR
30-01-2010, 11:37 PM
Thanks for the invite Pascal. It looks like you have a very talented crowd in the forum already. I know a lot of the names by their work or CV's...lots of right-click-save-as eyecandyness

I've gotta get round to getting down to New Zealand before I die. The place is just chock full of digital talent now. Would it be possible to fly my studio down there do you think!...lol
:rofl::rofl::beerchug:

nightwoodwolf
11-03-2010, 12:10 AM
Hey Pascal !! some great work you got going on here ... keep it up