It’s beginning to look a lot like spring. But not literally.
Were back again with another weekly update! Most of my progress this week had to do with the basic layout of the creature reference sheets, getting the evolution trees sketched and scanned, as well as starting to put together color schemes.
Reference Sheet Layouts
In order to have a clean and organized reference sheet I needed to come up with a basic layout design. So the first step to this was to jot down all of the things that would be important for an artist to know about a character.
I came up with this list of needed items to base my layout on:
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- Creature Name
- Creature Evolution Tree
- Color Palette
- Additional Design Details
The layout design includes 3 main sections and 5 subsections.
Section A indicates where the species’ common and scientific names will belong.
Section B is where the main evolution tree design will go. B1 indicates the Seedlet stage, B2 indicates the transitional Buddling stage, and B3 is where the final Blossom Anthid.
Section C is where the additional design details are located. C1 is where the color palette will be homed, and C2 is where any extra design details like patterning or body shape will go.
Evolution Tree Sketches
Now that I knew what needed to be housed in the reference sheets, I could start compiling the main aspect of it: The Evolution Tree.
Each Anthid in this initial trio has 3 stages of growth: Seedlet Buddling, and Blossom.
Last week I had gotten much of the final stages drawn out, and so I needed to work on the stages for the Seedlets and Buddlings.
Each of the three plant species actually has a different way of propagating and spreading.
For the Bumblebee Hybrid, Echinacea is like most flowers. They have seeds that get scattered and then new plants grow from there.
Bunny Eared Cacti can be cultivated by cutting off and drying a pad of the cactus before planting it in the soil. It is a very basic trimming method similar to cellular mitosis in a way. One plant gets split apart and then becomes two.
Now the Manta Ray Hybrid has the most interesting method of propagation in my opinion. Technically a seaweed isn’t a plant. It’s a type of multicellular algae, which are like plants. But not. If that makes any sense. There’s no real concrete definition for what an algae is other than they are photosynthetic eukaryotes.
Anyways.
Midshore Wrack is a doecious organism, meaning they have both male and female plants, and they reproduce through something called Broadcast Spawning. This spawning results in a zygote, meaning the basis of their reproduction is actually pretty similar to a humans in the bare bones of it all.
Color Palettes
There were tentative beginnings to color palette generating during the end of this week. I took inspiration from the plants themselves and created 3 color schemes for each to have an idea before I went in and started coloring things.
Update Fun Fact: Some species of Red Seaweed can have a life span of 6-10 years!
My goals for next week are to have the color schemes set and to start digitizing the reference sheets. I’m also hoping to start researching and brain storming possible names for these creatures.
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