Painting the Interdimensional Traveler - ZBrush Creature Design: Creating Dynamic Concept Imagery for Film and Games - page 317

Speculative Anatomy and Creature Design with Tristan
Schane
I am thrilled to share this chapter with New York-based concept designer, illustrator, sculptor, and painter
Tristan Schane. Here, Tristan shares a few tips as he walks through his creation of an insectoid alien
creature.
Whenever designing a character for myself or for a client, I always have two fundamentals of design in
mind. I try to consider the basic type of character and then, based on that, the physiognomy of that character.
Physiognomy can be interpreted to mean how the physical appearance influences our perception of charac-
ter.
Concept and Design
Firstly, I imagine an overall character type—is it reptilian, insect-like, a bone or rock creature? What type of
creature is it? I try to give the character a comprehensive concept. Unless the character is described as being
some kind of a hodge-podge of disparate elements, each aspect of the creature—limbs, head, tail, anten-
nae, etc.—must work within the whole conceptual framework. When creating a creature, I can't help myself
imagining my design like it must have evolved somewhere. Its entire form would result from an imagined
environment. This helps me visualize the character better. What type of claws might it have? Where does it
fit in the imagined ecosystem's food chain? What's the creature's general level of intelligence (more intelli-
gent creatures might need a design that enables the use of tools, for example)?
The other fundamental is the physiognomy—how the musculature and skeletal structure (if it's to have
one) works. For me, the fun of creature design is creating a strange limb or a complex facial structure, and
then defining the anatomy to show how these body parts will likely move. The term I use when describing
this process is Speculative Anatomy . I should say when talking of anatomy I am also thinking of skin and
fatty tissue, which also—when rendered realistically—add to the quality of a creature's design. Here you
can see how I have taken care to determine how the exoskeletal plates of this character interlock and articu-
late from the back view ( Figure 5-91 ) .
Figure 5-91: The exoskeletal articulations as seen from behind