Luckily, the art room of the Shanghai American School had a human skeleton and the skull of a Marco Polo sheep. I had 25 minutes left in my presentation, so I thought I'd do a creature design demo.
If I could blend the two skulls together, I could show the students how to create a satyr. I started by lightly drawing the satyr skull with its eye sockets facing forward, a long nose, big cheekbones, and a prognathic mouth.
I explained how you have to think about perspective not only with buildings and cars, but with a symmetrical form like this. The horns, ears, and eyes have to line up along receding perspective lines.
(Above: sketch by Jeanette) Apart from the creature-design challenge, I find the idea of blending two different species to be profoundly exciting and disturbing. It was once the province of mythology and science fiction, but now the real science is at our doorsteps, as the following TED talks explores.
Shanghai Diary Series:
Part 1: Getting There
Part 2: American School
Part 3: Old Town
Part 4: Jujiajiao
Part 5: Goat Man
Part 6: Sketching in Restaurants
Part 7: China Rising
Part 8: Chinese/Russian Drawing
Part 9: Sketching in Shanghai (Video)
Beautiful work. I always love your creature design; they're always so well-thought-out and sincere.
ReplyDeleteThat Satyr is so damned painterly! You are a master of the water soluble colored pencil. Please include a segment with that media in your DVD.
ReplyDeleteJust saw this article on the anthropomorphism of Disney's "Robin Hood"
ReplyDeletehttp://characterdesignnotes.blogspot.de/2010/10/study-in-anthropomorphism-disneys-robin.html