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Tutorial: Species Design
Published: 2011-04-29 14:59:42 +0000 UTC; Views: 63359; Favourites: 2289; Downloads: 974
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Description
A tutorial going over some of the concepts I try to follow when doing species and character design. It's pretty general suggestions so that it can be applied towards different types of characters.I hope you enjoy!
Disponible en espaΓ±ol aquΓ: [link]
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Edit: Holy crap. A DD!
Thank you SO much to =Sarky-Sparky for the suggestion and to `FantasyStock for the feature. Of all the pieces in my gallery, I'm really thrilled that it was this one. I love creating characters, and I hope that people find this useful in making their own!
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Comments: 243
Thank you for this!
It contains a lot of usefull information, i've learned a lot! <3
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My pleasure! Β I'm glad that it helped you! Β
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I like the part where you showing clothes coloring tips!
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Thank you! Β I'm really glad to hear
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Thanks! I hope it's helpful.
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Just love this I am so going to use this to help plan out my concepts
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Interesting, while it might make sense for them to have evolved from natural fruit bats of earth I want to take a slightly more fantasy approach still, however I will keep that in mind since I think I can sort of use that still.
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If you're taking a more fantasy approach, then you can also do subtle things like play up the bat shapes but use different color markings. It really depends on your species and their environment and their modern culture too.
Are they still primitive or have they become advanced? Maybe they wear tribal pants as decorations, or use piercings, etc.
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Well this is good then. Most of what you listed is what I already thought of.
So..I suppose I'm not doing that badly if so.
I mean I feel like their culture has more depth than most stories.
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Well if you have any specific designs you'd like me to look over I'd be happy to at least give you some feedback.
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It's all mainly a jumble of information in text right now
I'm working on a ref-ish thing though
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That's unusually generous of someone of a much higher degree of skill. But I suppose you can look at what I have written so far.
[link]
Styx's armor is probably going to be the default look for the Okkokem btw.
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Blah. 
Let me go and take a look!
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Question, I want to make a species based off of bats and of course I want them to be different enough from the animal that they are a recognizable species. But I'm too stubborn to think up anything to make them more diverse at the same time.
I guess what I'm trying to ask is what are things that make a well designed species and a poorly designed one? I don't want to have random things like extra eyes, spines or or flashy colors just for the hell of it. I've spent a lot of time on their culture after all and I want their physiology to have some meaning
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In that case you'd want to start with where they come from and how they would have realistically evolved depending on their environment.
I'd first do some studying on the basic creature you want it to evolve from, then maybe do those studies like they show monkies turning into humans, to show the different evolutionary stages. While you're doing this take into mind their environment. Why are they evolving? What was it about their environment that forced this change to occur?
Example: Perhaps the food source of the bats dried up, forcing them to find new types of food. This brought about a change in their instincts, learning behaviors, and perhaps the shape of their mouth and eyes for hunting.
Evolution is caused by mutations that change us -for the better- in terms of survival in our environments. Giraffe necks are believed to be so long because the tallest giraffes can reach the tallest trees (their food source). They were stronger and able to survive better, so the shorter giraffes died off while the taller ones flourished and became the dominant type.
After all that, you can embellish a little bit. Lots of species have decorative elements for one reason or another. Peacocks use their colors to win over the ladies, chameleons use their color changing to hide from predators, etc.
Have fun with it and I hope that helps!
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My pleasure! I hope it's helpful.
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Wow!
I love how easy to understand the tutorial is, and how it goes into detail to every part of species creation. It'll help me bigtime for my sci-fi story that takes place on another planet ^^
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No problem! It's awesome how you dissected each part of species creation; something alot of tutorials leave out c:
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Great tip on using the masking layer! I never knew I could do that.
Thanks~
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My pleasure
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This tutorial explains a lot in a very detailed way
It's very hard to find something interesting, helpful and awesome like this around. Thanks you so much for sharing this
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I'm so glad you enjoyed it and I really hope that it's helpful.
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Thanks so much!
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This is an amazing tut (And amazing art skills >.>) I definitely find it useful,You're probably gonna say no but could post this to my group ? (And I'm sorry for spelling original wrong) It's okay if you say no...
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Absolutely you may.
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Sorry for being an idiot but how do you send requests?
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Hehe let me just submit it I think htat might be easier.
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This tutorial is so detailed and well explained <3
I'll definitely be looking at it when I'm at Camp Tecumseh for three days.
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Thank you so much! I really hope it comes in handy!
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Very interesting to see the process laid out. Thank you!
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thank you for such a lovely tutorial.
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<3 My pleasure, I hope it is handy!
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It is, indeed it is very handy!
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Hello! I've featured this resource in my latest journal !
Thank you for sharing with the community!
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Aww thank you so much for the feature, I hope that people find it useful.
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You're very welcome!
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Awesome tutorial! I really like that you also explain how to work out your designs and not simply talk about idea finding. As well I love that you also spoke about colors and cloth design. This tut will be helpful for making my own designs^^
I still have one question: How am I able to apply a layer mask?
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