beast WIP

dangerkid

Hi all! This'll be my first post here!

I'm just started work on this. I'm calling it a "thistle-backed thylacine", though the form looks more wolf-like, the markings will be similar to the thylacine. I decided last second that the thylacine body form just looks to docile.

Anyhoo - I've never rigged a quadruped before so I want to be sure that I've got the mesh appropriate as possible for deformation. He's 998 tris (my budget is 1000) so I can't add anything, but can possibly rearrange. His mouth and jaw and face will have simple rigging as well. Oh, and the planes below him are for fur alphas.

Thanks!

usagi

looks cool. i think the fangs and the snout are too thin, imo. the paws might be too big unless youre going for a cartoony look.
nice job

Asherr

you seem to have completely removed an resemblence to a thylacine (tasmanian wolf/tiger for those that don't know) when you decided a thylacine body looked too docile. now it just looks like a wolf with long fangs, spikes on it's back, and a long tail. while a thylacine would have smaller round ears, a long narrow body, longer tail (nearly as long as the body), and stockier legs.

other than that i would make the claws part of the foot instead of the seperate triangles as you have them now. that should give you a few more polygons to work back into the foot and give it a more naturalistic shape.
also the spikes on the back don't look natural. they should flow with the body. either in a similar formation to what you already have with all the tips pointing towards the tail or in a ridge along the spine. you can't just stick spikes on a creature randomly and expect it to look good. spikes pointing forward would not be a good evolutionary solution. they would get caught in brush or tree limbs to easily tangling the creature as it pursues its prey. rear pointing spikes would allow the creature to flow through undergrowth much more easily.
also going along those lines, the saber-teeth would get broken off too easy right now. they should be thicker and the creature would then have a thicker neck and heavier jaw to withstand the impact of using the saber-teeth to kill.

dangerkid

hey, thanks for the replys!
usagi - they are a bit large, but yeah... i was going for a somewhat stylized exaggerated look

Asherr - you're totally right, the resemblance to a real thylacine was completely (and quickly) worked out of it, so perhaps i really shouldn't even be mentioning that aspect. As far as everything else goes, my sister (who is a vet) has made similar comments I'll probably be doing a slight rework taking all of that into effect. Thanks!

dangerkid

I just finished up some rework and texturing. I reset the spikes in the same direction and was able to add an additional one by stripping a few polys outta the tongue thereby bringing the total count to exactly 1000. Also made some proportion and positioning adjustments.

Here's a the textured version:

usagi

nice, that skin looks sweet. i really like the design on the shoulder.

i think those alpha plains are too blurry though. also the fur doesnt really flow with the body. its especially noticable on the cheeks adn hind legs

nice work though. it looks surprisingly badass

Josh_Singh

It looks like the gmorg from never ending story.