bitfox's fox

bit.fox

hello people of the polycount,
To get a grasp of ZBrush I started sculpting a little fox. I'm aiming towards something stylized might fit into dota. Tvidotto's Blurr is a beautiful example.
But I want to create a fox, not a cat.
And that's my problem. Huge round eyes fit very well with the body's bulkiness and the round head. A fox is a lot slender. For example that long and thin snout. But if I increase the head for stylization-reasons it starts to feel even more imbalanced than it already does. Is the "waist" too slim? The hips too wide? I tried a couple different things, I just can't put my finger on what's not working.

TL;DR: It feels a bit imbalanced. Why?

Stinkfoot

What are you using as reference? Reference is a vey important factor, even when creating a stylized version of something.

For me I look how something actually looks, for instance the fox.



Taking fur in account with the sculpting you see that the head is actually a lot smaller on the picture, also, the transition from tail to body is a lot thicker and they have a thicker legs then you'd imagine. a shorter nose and slightly smaller ears.

Once you get the basic fox shape down you can start to exaggerate features, creating that stylized look. but nailing that fox shape first helps a lot I think.

bit.fox

Thanks for taking the time!
I thought so as well. I would have no clue as to what belongs to where if I wouldn't first have tried to sculpt a somewhat proper fox. The idea was that once I have the basic shapes and forms it's only a matter of positioning and scaling to get to that stylized look.

My reference sheet looks like this:



Then I started sculpting from that reference sheet and from there I looked up some stylized foxes to see which parts would be exaggerated. And then I tried to emulate that into my own sculpt.
Like this:





Now that I look at it after a good night sleep I see that the original's proportions might already be off. It's legs seem a bit long.

bit.fox

Definately went too head and chest-heavy before. In addition to the low hip I can see now why he felt so imbalanced.
Tweaks from today: