The arrowtongue.

I decided to practice my modeling skills in MAYA on one of Wayne Barlowe's aliens, the Arrowtongue.
I used the arrowtongue as a subject before on the morphing circle exercise. I think I choose it because it's a nice looking creature and it has a simple shape.







Things to improve:
Bigger head
more defined dorsal spikes
Longer ventral appendages
Smaller subdivisions for more detail in wrinkles at the joints
More detail at the base of the tongue

Once I've done the modeling, I'm gonna rig it up and let it loose. Tongue and all.

Here is one of the pictures I used for reference. The problem with this one is that it's a re-imagining concept art that was done for the Alien Planet documentary that discovery did based on Expedition.



Though I mostly used the expedition book for reference, that way they look how they're supposed to.

Luminopticates

luminopticates (name meaning 'light eyes') are Fentil predators that could be most closely compared to wolves on Earth, many species hunting animal prey in packs.

The small red dots are photophores that luminopticates can use to see in the dark and are also linked to expressing emotion when interacting with other individuals.
These predators have toxic bulbs at the end of flexible rods which they use to stun/kill prey. The rods themselves are modified legs (they are hexapods, although unrelated to hexapod forkheads) and are usually used to assist balance.
In infants, they are used more defensively and also to help the parent find its offspring by reflecting light, effectively creating a SOS beacon.

Their large leathery feet have 3 'toes'; two grooved pads on the outside, with the middle toe folding forwards and under the foot, curling up behind the 'ankle' (which, like all of the leg joints, only bends forwards.) These claws are used for climbing and holding prey.
Opportunistic hunters, most luminopticates will hunt whatever they can.

Their main give-away to the relation to vertebrates is the reproductive organs located on the dorsal side of the body, in this case protected by a tough spike.

I think the baby one is cute.


For this I used the rule of thirds thing and some colour palettes.

Let's pick things up again...

Here are some pages from the sketchbook I doodled in over the holiday:














-

Also, I made some short clips for a help haiti gig in London for the background screen.





They wanted a pixelated sort of look, which I did. I haven't done anything with this style since I stopped using the Games Factory, which was an amazing piece of software.
Apparently they looked good on the big screens, so yay. Hope the gig helped.
I don't like how youtube's embeddor doesn't fit properly. Ah well.

I'm back bay-beh!

let the workings begin!