Sidekick's profile and some sketches

Now for the sidekick Chi'ara, a feral lady with the taste for blood loyal only to Syriff. This will make the most sense if you read the character profile for Syriff first, in the posts below

Character profile

Name: Chi’ara

Role: Escaped galactic prisoner following and protecting Syriff as she owes him a life debt   Age: 21 Height:  5’7” Weight: 119 kg Hair colour: Typically silver but Tuskar females show emotion and communicate through manipulation of the pigment in their hair. Eye colour: Grey/white but are also affected by the pigment manipulation Personality: Loyal with a vicious streak, she very rarely talks but does communicate with Syriff through body language and grunts  Clothing: Rough leathers and furs but has no sense of modesty and only wears them because Syriff gave her them Weapon(s): Claws and tusk are her preferred weapons but she can use a pistol if it is needed.   Skills: An agile and unrelenting warrior whose attacks are so refined and graceful that it seems more like she is dancing. Occupation: Tuskar forager until the day she was taken now she follows and protects Syriff. Back story: Chi’ara is the youngest daughter of her clan’s Chief which to the rest of the clan makes her worthless. The Tuskars are seen as a feral sub-human race with only a very basic form of speech they hunt the wild for meat and furs and live in caves or high quality huts made from pelts and bones. Being seen as worthless she always tried to prove her worth going out on hunts alone but even when she was successful her skill was never rewarded. She was out hunting the day that the Galactic State Marines arrived at Syriff’s farm. She would usually hunt there and from experience knew that Syriff and his grandfather were not a threat, but on this day there where strangers in the field outside his house. Curious Chi’ara approached the marines and was rewarded by her curiosity with a graze from a laser, she let out a shrill cry as the marines chased her. Syriff heard the noise and ran to her aid, quickly through her over his shoulder and ran back to the house. Syriff fough bravely to protect both his sickly grandfather and Chi’ara but whilst running for his grandfathers room he took a laser blast to his legs. Chi’ara seen him take the blast and went berserk cutting down three of the marines in a tremendous blur of tusks, blood and claws, she seem to almost fly around the room. As she appeared at Syriff’s side she was taken by surprise and easily restrained, she thrashed and continued thrashing whilst the leader killed Syriff’s grandfather in front of them. Chi’ara’s hair and eyes began to glow a magnificent red as she cried out a blood curdling scream but was rendered unconscious by the butt of the marine’s rifle. She awoke to find herself in a strange place with Syriff asleep by her side, she checked the old building they were in and determined it was safe, returning to Syriff’s side where she curled up with her hair lighting the room a dim purple. She guarded Syriff until he woke and determined to stay by his side she followed him in his revolution and escaped the prison planet. Now Syriff vows to avenge his grandfather and Chi’ara intends to help him do so.

Sketchbook scans

 Here I have scanned some of my sketchbook work that's not really tied to any of my Uni work. The first three are quick 30 min character designs that I did with two of my classmates Connor (http://artofbearrsky.blogspot.co.uk/) and Aled (sorry Aled can't find your blog), they started a quick idea session to which they kindly invited me to join. In this session each of us picked an overall theme for the group to build a character upon, from here there 30 minute timer began whilst we quickly looked for reference online for inspiration and general style. I picked Hindu because I know very little about it and its out of my comfort zone. Aled chose Samurai and Connor chose Apachi spirit warrior, I used some pastels and a ballpoint pen.

 The rest are all random sketches I did on my way to Uni either on the bus or train. I'm really enjoying using public transport just for the chance to doodle or sketch for 20 minutes or so before class, it really helps loosen up my mind and try different concepts and perspectives.

quick one of myself

To the left is a quick attempt at a demonic super hero, can you tell who it is?

Lately I've been trying to get a bit more movement into my work,
mostly spurred on by the sense of motion that can
be seen in most of Yoshitaka Amano's work
(Concept/character artist for most
 of the final fantasy franchise) 

Another attempt at getting some motion into my work, this time I have noted the way Amano's characters can almost be seen a dancing and tried to use this in my own studies.

Okay that's all for now but there will be more later today, such as my sci-fi sidekick's profile and some sketches and concepts of the Duo.

Character design and digital painting

I've started my character development and as part of that I have to create profiles for my sci-fi duo, so here is my first attempt at the protagonist Syriff along with some thumbnails and a bit of the photoshop painting I've been doing.

Character profile

Name: Syriff

Role: Escaped galactic prisoner Leading the Duo  Age: 25  Height:  7’10”  Weight: 132 kg  Hair colour: white and brown  Eye colour: Steel blue  Personality: Although his outward appearance is that of a menacing brute he is calm and collected constantly thinking ahead with a quiet and still mind like that of a much older strategist.  Clothing: Synth-skin a bio-mechanical wetsuit like material that regulates body temperature which protects against high-tech weapon blasts such as plasma or laser rifles, which he wears under his rough leathers and scrap metal armour. His hands are bound  Weapon(s): Mechanical leg prosthetics with built-in thrusters offering enhanced kick speed, flight (depending on fuel) and strength. The machinery is permanently fused to his flesh and bone. Skills: Strategically minded, Occupation: He was a farm hand on the agricultural planet Ka’orn until he was imprisoned for protecting a wild female alien from Galactic State Marines a collection of alien species united under a morally corrupt high Council  Back story: A simple farm boy who spent a lot of time with his adoptive grandfather who taught him the value of patients, cunning and hard work through the tasks he set him and the board games he forced him to play. His grandfather’s health had been in decline for a while but by Syriff’s 20th birthday he could no longer leave his bed, leaving Syriff struggling to maintain the farm and pay the bills. Until, one day the Galactic State Marines came to Ka’orn offering the inhabitants the ultimatum of join the GSM or die. The government and its people refused and fighting began with thousands of drop ships raining troops down on the people of Ka’orn. On the 3rd day of the attack Syriff awoke at his grandfather’s bedside to gunfire on the farm, he quickly grabbed his grandfather’s service rifle from the wall and ran out to the fields. He found a female Tuskar (a feral race of battle raised, sub-humans) with laser burns running from a group of GS Marines, he quickly ran to her aid shooting two of the marines and leading her to seek cover in his house but the marines quickly surrounded and entered his house. Fearing for his grandfather he ran for his room but took a blast to the legs and losing consciousness as he hit the ground. He came to, to find his grandfather trying to fight the marines but falling to the ground. The Tuskar was restrained but wildly snapping at the leader, a humanoid with a red streak through his hair walking towards his grandfather. Through blurred eyes he watched as the marine stomped on the back of his grandfather’s head slowly twisting his heel as he reached for his gun. Syriff struggled to the doorway barely able to crawl, screaming for him to stop. He heard the leader mutter “filthy backwater scum” as he fired the gun, Syriff reached for his grandfather’s body but before he could his face met with the leaders boot knocking him unconscious again. He awoke on a prison mining planet with the Tuskar by his side, his hands bound and what was left of his legs held together by metal and wires. The prisoners were forced to mine to get food, there were no guards on the planet just automated ships that would trade food for the minerals and ore which they mined daily. After a year Syriff   lead an uprising with the Tuskar Chi’ara by his side, using low tech projectiles, crude explosives and even nets made from scrap wiring, to capture the food ships. The plan worked and they are now on their way to seek revenge on the Marine and the rulers of the Galactic State that took their lives from them.   Just some thumbnails I'll follow this up with some scans of my sketchbook thumbs next week.

Below is a sketch form a life drawing class from about 2 years ago, as part of my digital painting class I have scanned it and painted into it on photoshop. Now that I have it all painted I plan to pick from a list of female demons or mythical creatures and have some fun making her into one of them.

For my next post I'll have some vehicle thumbs and concepts of my Magnetic Ore Harvester.

Interior Assets

Continuing from my last post I will be displaying my couch and TV models and textures and some of the reasoning behind what on the TV, out the window and how I tried to instill  narrative.

So to re-begin I'm going to start with the couch, I had a lot of fun with the texture for this one and painting in the couch creases really helped me work out how my normal map should look. I made it from scratch on Photoshop starting with a combination of filters on a dark pink background to get the pink cord texture that I wanted, as its for a teenage girls apartment.

after laying down the basic texture I began painting in the creases, folds, stitching and buttons making sure to use a darker pink for depth and a lighter pink for the more raised areas, this makes it a lot easier to transition to a normal map as all that is needed is to make a copy of the layer and desaturate it.

lastly I added the a simple wood texture to the front and applied it and the other maps to the model.

For the TV texture I again used a number of filters and a few gradients to mimic metal. For the screen I painted the Manic Mech into a picture of a street with the right lighting I was looking for and later used it as a background to be visible through the window and wall hole. The attack is actually happening outside and is the reason for the broken wall, I used these assets to hint at the underlying narrative.

below are the assets in my final renders. For my next post I will upload some Character creation thumbs and concepts.