Doodles

Just some random doodles I did while at work, which were cross posted on my main blog.

I didn't have his ref sheet so his proportions (on both sheets) are off; all in all though he's still a leggy and army creature. Something that will be interesting to explore, especially since his arms aren't as human in proportion compared to Sonic's or most other Mobian's on my list. his humerus and hand anatomy is closer to a canine's.

Antoine's Apartment

Yay! Technical boring design stuff! How fun is this?!

But on a serious note, doing these kinds of things is important to me, mostly because I'm neurotic and feel as though planning things out as much as possible makes the story and visuals more consistent as well as save time in the long run.

I'm not going to design every little element in his apartment because a lot of the more simple aspects can be drawn on the spot. But these more detailed objects are utensils he interacts with a lot in one portion of the story so I felt it was necessary to nail down their approximate look down from the get go as well as plan his house layout.

Now I can move onto his jalopy Vespa! Then I have to design his third outfit and the exterior of his building as well as the basic elements of his block. :B Maybe I'm putting too much thought into this... but it will be worth it! :D

Environmental Sketches

I did more of these on my main blog but since they're not sonic related most of them are staying there for the time being.

There's actually a lot of environments and nit picky little details I will be exploring with each of these but for now they're "jot down the idea" conceptual type pieces.

Out of all the most complex environments it would have to be Acorn's kingdom which is surrounded by Knothole Woods which is located within a huge labyrinth of woods that's about two to three states deep, so it's flippin huge.

The palace is a ziggurat shaped structure that is powered by clean energy produced by a chaos emerald located underneath in a pool of molten metals kept down at the core of the building. These same metals are also used to produce small power rings that are used as batteries of sorts for the local inhabitants.

I wanted the palace to be secured and hard to find. So although things aren't really to scale here, the slopping trees are actually animalistic beings that are genetically geared to protecting anything from coming near the chaos emerald. Which is why villagers of this area have to use hidden underground tunnels to get in and out of Acorn's metropolis.  Light is also limited and scattered within the area, much like a rain forrest.

From there, the forrest is a deep canopy inhabited by sentinels and then by knothole villagers with the exterior inhabited by various goblin races. Although the two dislike each other, they tend to maintain a truce.

Most peoples who try an navigate through any part of this forest tend to die from starvation or being killed by the local flora and fauna.

Not much to say about this. :B Antoine rides a bike because he's dirt poor. So expect a lot of sketches of bikes once I'm done with his ref sheet.

Sonic running from some baddies.

Sonic Turn Sheets 2.0

Hey there guys! I was going to be pumping out a shit ton of stuff Sonic related but then I got the sick from a little cousin of mine, or someone... I BLAME SOMEONE. On that note however, turn sheets! This will most likely be Sonic's finale look.

As you can tell from the above, Sonic (as are all Mobians) are genetically composed of human and various animal DNA that give them the appearance of an anthropomorphic singular species despite having various genetic material or little to no relation to the perceived species. In the case of his blue fur, it's a color morph originating to distant feliform DNA which contains the genetic coding for blue fur phenotypes. "Hedgehogs" have a much more obvious mutagen of the gene compared to "cats" and their fur hues tend to be cool colors such as blues, purples, greys, and whites.

The insectivore and rodent based Mobians are the shortest mammalians topping out at around 3-4 feet. In the case of Sonic, he is actually one of the tallest in his group toping out close to four feet. Unlike Antoine, who has four toes per foot and much shorter proximal, middle, and distal phalanges, Sonic has longer portions of that area along with a fifth toe. His hands are also more common to his species grouping in that his metacarpals and proximal phalanges are shorter creating "mousy" hands.

He carries instincts similar to his hedgehog heritage in that he will roll or prickle up when experiencing a negative emotion or turn his head downward and "saw." His "species" tends to thrive in warm climates such as islands and deserts.

There's an "oopsie" or two I need to correct but I will do it tomorrow, lol...

PS: Few Mobians have last names in the more human or Overlander sense and tend to carry last names typical to their "species" or visual grouping. They, instead of IDing each other based on last names, consider first and middle names more important.

Sonic is a bit of a contrast when it comes to how his species acts. Although it is noted that hedgehogs are quite brazen and are slow to admit personal errors, they are generally very wary and forward thinking in their actions in order to prevent the former. Depending on the pedigree, this is either a genetic or a learned trait.

Test Page Of Sorts

This ended up being one o those test that I was originally gungho about but then ended up drawing due to neurotic things that bothered me about it. This isn't to say that I wont do a comic! I most certainty will... it's just that I'm picky about the long and tone of things.

My main problem with this test is that Sonic has yet to have a defined look that I'm satisfied with from all angles. In fact, his father has a more solid design than Sonic does at this point, and that's kind of bothersome. :B Then again, taking something as iconic as Sonic and making it your own while sticking the formulas for him that work is a bit daunting!

He's a character who I think would benefit from more inspired elements from his father ranging from "hair" to muzzle style and it's an aspect of his design I will be tacking thanksgiving break while trying to nail down certain elements that will make him fit with the rest of the cast while being his own. I've somewhat succeed here with that goal; and I think giving him less chiseled features and a shorter stature could help with that.

But the main goal, seeing what format would work with the characters and practicing certain elements had some good learning points! I would much prefer this comic be horizontal in layout, but I will have to sketch out parts of book one to see how well that will translate as a page to page thing.

Nate Morgan (but mostly Robotnik)

I'm pretty sure this guy is based off of Morgan Freeman, just a hunch... Anyways, since I did that image of Robotnik I was compelled to explore Nate more. I've done so in the past, but I thought it would be interesting to draw a younger Nate to compare to the old one in present day. 

SPOILER: 

You will notice a lot of images that take place in Ivo's (Robotnik) youth show him interacting with Nate a lot. In fact, it is Nate who surgically repairs his eyes and it is Nate who becomes his physical therapist. 

At the time Robotnik looses his eyes he's around 10-13 years of age; Nate's around 23-25. Robotnik views Nate in a complex manner, that of a friend and a servant. Although he doesn't have much empathy that one would consider normal, Ivo does have a habit of expressing it towards him, at least in their youth. 

// END SPOILER // 

Anyways, both Nate and Ivo are Overlanders. Unlike Robotnik, Nate has more human proportions while Robotnik shows traits more common to Overlanders, that is, anatomy being way out of proportion in comparison to one another. This is due to them being partially composed of animal DNA and are the human equivalent to the Gremlin race (beings like Lupe, Big, Rouge, ect)

I haven't decided wether or not Nate will have more dwarf like proportions or not. Snively was intended to fill that role (for the sake of anatomical variety) but I think Nate looks a bit too human, and could benefit from some alterations in his anatomy to make his race more apparent. 

I should also note that all Overlanders have cool colored mouths. With tongues and gums ranging from blue, purple. and black in appearance. I don't why I'm sharing this, has no significance considering this is colored. That being said I felt as though it was an important minor detail.

These sketches right here are a few months old. Anatomically I like them, especially the top head, reminds me of the 90's sprite of Robotnik in his ship.

Image from here.

Call me nostalgia based, but I much prefer the older Japanese design of Robotnik. I think it's design left more to the imagination when I was a kid. But I also liked the 90's version of him to from SAT:AM.

My version of him is aiming between a cute and cuddly but nightmarish dictator with a child's mentality.

The major characteristic about my version of Robotnik is that you never see his eyes. As a child, he wears glasses and the lighting is always such that his eyes are hidden by the shadow reflection of his lenses. That and he's "eyes" you do see are very mechanic and make noises like a camera when focusing or changing modes from daylight, infrared, or night vision. I've always had a fascination of showing the deadness eyes possess when seen from a mechanical standpoint. And the design of my yes were inspired by the squiddies from the animatrix and Hal 9000.

Level 1

Short story time! But ti does contain spoilers. :U

He looks normal here, because Overlanders don't mutate until they're in their mid to late teens. He's in his early tweens here so he looks pretty normal, except for the black tongue and gums. :B


+ + + + + +

Beep, beep beep, beep, beep… His eyes darted, but there was nothing.

Beep, beep, beep, beep… He felt a chill coming from the left of him, and a soft, almost comforting and familiar warmth from underneath his hand.

Beep, beep, his hand rose to his face. He halted, from the hall he heard the rolling of wheels on a smooth surface, moaning and brisk commands shooting down as he darted his eyes frantically, still noting.

Amongst the clatter a soft gait could be heard. Shoes, he knew it was the sound of shoes, nice ones; not like the ones he had. Maybe this being's shoes even had shoelaces, or sturdy soles, the boy was momentarily preoccupied by the perceived comfort these shoes must have had for their owner.

"Hello, boy."

The boy didn't respond.

"How are you feeling today."

"My name is not boy." He replied curtly. Paper flipped clumsily as he darted his eyes, still nothing. "Well we will have to call you boy until you give us a name."

"Where am I?" He heard the sound of something thin and light falling on a cushioned surface. "I cannot tell you that unless you give us a name." The boy's mouth pursed with a queer grin, "why so secretive?" A short pause, "there are no secrets here, we just want your name."  The boy smelled the room, felt the rhythms of the people in there with them, there was much whispering and ginger movements and he could feel the man's feverish heartbeat in the breath that hit his face.

"You found my blaster and want to know how it works." A stifled silence entered the room as the boy listened for a response. "To be more precise, we want to know how a child got access to it." The man finally responded.

"You mean, you want to know how I made it." There was slight laughter in the room. "You're laughing, but you don't even know how to use it, and you know it doesn't have a serial." The room became silent again. "Plus it has technological capacities not located within our borders." The man's voice became serious, "And nothing like it has been made since the hundred year war… How did you come across writings for such a technology."

The boy looked around, still nothing, "Well it could be easier if I could see in here, seeing would be nice, but they ripped out my eyes. Might trust you more with eyes, but I already don't - so whatever." He heard the man shifting his position with agitation."You mean the Mobians." The man responded. The boy paused, "……. yea. Did you know they actually bathe?"

"Boy, how did you come across the writings for this technology…"

"Dolt, I didn't… I found an image of a man on a galonae like beast - a statue. In his hand he had a gun type thing. So I built it."

"You can't just build something that complex with no direction… Especially if the technology is dead - no reference. You needed -"

"You can if you're a god." The boy smiled even more, "I don't need books or algorithms to build what I see in my head. Or a calculator."

 The man scoffed, "you can't even read!"

"Does a bird need to read to understand aerodynamics? Does a termite need to understand pedology or the cat physics?"  The doctor recoiled, "They're beasts, of course not!"

The boy's mouth became stiff, "they're savants." His hand absently crept against the grooves of the covers until it came across something hallow and light, they became preoccupied and his face calmed."Give me eyes and I will explain my gun to you."

"Give me your name first."

"You know you can't use the technology without me, did you try already? I made a special key." He began playing with a notch located in the back of the hollow object until it could be twisted no further. "And killing or torturing me would do no good, I don't feel pain like most of us." He let the object writhe in his hands. "So give me eyes and I will give you my clubhouse."

A hand snapped to someone in the distance as they walked away briskly. "How about this, give us a name for your eyes, and your services for your freedom, Overlander…"

The boy clasped the figure in his hands, preventing it from moving as the mechanisms halted. "So you're not me. But you smell so much like me. Interesting…" He  gently caressed the toy, "You're not a threat, but I like games. Do you like games? I do…. So this is level one, and player two needs a name. What is yours?" The man readjusted himself, "Prometheus."

The boy's face brightened.

 "Ivo. Let the games begin."