This a is a creature Design for
CG Hubs Creature Forge Challenge # 69 The Royal Scythe. The creature design prompt calls for an animal with a long scythe shaped beak from which it gets its name. It's supposed to be a very elegant and beautiful creature with striking color that spends its time sun bathing and using its long beak to fetch prey from crevasses and cracks in it's environment.
What I've posted here is the reference sheet I composed and the initial gray scale sketch I created for the creature. As you can probably see from my ref sheet the Scythe has the general posture and anatomy of various flightless birds. I've taken inspiration from hadrosaurs to flesh out the shape of its head, and the sail from an odd therapod called Concavenator to figure out the structure of the fin on its back.
The creature was one of the few and rare instances where the visual component of the of the design was very clear and well developed in my mind before I began to sketch, for which I'm thankful. There are still a lot of things to figure out, but I'm having a lot of fun with this guy. Hope to post more soon.
1.5 hrs
Adobe Photoshop CS5, Intuos 4 Tablet
Artwork © Raul Ramos All Rights Reserved