Project Brief
This project was a self produced brief, where I was planning to design a collection of creatures to fit within my high fantasy world of Rotunnis. This is the Bloomjaw.
The aim was to create 2D creature sheets for each creature. I made sure each were unique, however fit within the same world well. The Bloomjaw is a creature located in the Ferezovian Kingdom, with different regional variants.
Moodboards
For this creature I wanted to think a lot about camouflage. A beautiful bougainvillea forest spreads across the entire kingdom, with different regional colours.
I wanted this creature to have a similar appearance to a rabbit or hare, with similar mechanisms of hiding like orchid mantis. I also had a look at some birds with crowns, as I liked the flower look they had.
Iterations
The Jaw
My original sketch felt quite generic, I felt that it looked very similar to some Pokémon, and that wasn't the style I was going for. I tried a new angle, making it seem sweet initially, but a vicious predator. I removed its eyes, giving it an exceptionally large mouth. It has a split bottom jaw, like some snakes, and a double hinge like some ancient fish. This gives it a terrifying weapon. I also gave it an infrared sensor on it's tail, to give it slightly better locational abilities.
Regional Subspecies
Now I had a basic form, I wanted to figure out the five subspecies, and decide which one to polish into a final design. Each of them blend in well with their surroundings, as well as having fur fit for their climate.
The favourites were the pink and purple ones, due to their texture and patterns, out of those two, I chose to take the purple one forward as I loved the texture of the fur.
The Deliverables
I made a character sheet, featuring orthographic views, a colour pallet, and a posed illustration to show the personality.
I used a dog playing as reference, wanting to show it with it's mouth closed in at least one drawing.
I blocked out the colours over the sketch, then blocked out the basic light and shadow with orange on soft light, and light blue on multiply. I kept adding highlights and shadows to add depth, as well as using some texturing brushes to make sure the fur looked right.
The Bloomjaw
The Bloomjaw is a creature that roams the Kingdom of Ferezovia. It lives in the forest that spans the entire land of the kingdom, changing greatly in it’s appearance throughout the different temperatures and humidities. They are about 90cm long (rear to nose), and 55cm tall (top of head), weighing around 25kg.
They blend in with their environment, appearing the same colour as the bougainvillea flowers that bloom in their region, adorned with small tufts of fur mimicking the flowers appearance. Notably, they are missing a key feature most animals have, eyes. To compensate for their loss of vision, they have small infrared sensors on their tails, allowing them to see vague heat patterns, however their main source of locating is their huge ears and impeccable hearing. Their sight was given up for a good cause, it made room for a special kind of jaw, equipped with a double hinge and a split bottom. It opens extremely wide, equipped with forty-four teeth.
Hunting in packs, they click their jaws ever so slightly to locate one another. Hiding in bushes with their tails sticking out the top. They are very successful predators, eating creatures much larger than themselves. They make their way up trees by jumping and using their claws, sleeping in the upper branches to stay camouflaged overnight.
They play with each other often, wrestling and fighting. They are very vocal, yapping and grumbling with each other. Their packs range from around twenty to fifty, with some as large as eighty members.
Final Designs
