Saur's Various Arts Blog

My official art blog To see more of my crappy art, just go visit my DA page at: http://bellumsaur.deviantart.com/

[saursart]

I was stuck figuring out what exactly to draw as at the time, I felt in the mood to draw something Spyro-related but was struggling to continue with what I started. But, now, I had an actual idea I worked on, one that surmised the different games I had played throughout February, in the form of the elder dragons seen in the Reignited version of the original Spyro the Dragon. First off, Red Dead Redemption 2, which I had finally beat on Sunday the 10th and had been busy playing afterward up until Tuesday the 19th. I imagined the dragon representing that game to be pretty bulky, referencing Arthur's build in that game (which makes you realize just how damn scrawny John Marston is in comparison), and wearing the blue shirt and yellow vest I had him sport for a good chunk of the game. For his design, I took inspiration both from bearded dragons and from the appearance of the Reignited version of Tomas. For his wings, I made them brown and feathered, as a reference to both the hawks in the game and to Eagle Flies. Also, he's holding a Schofield, the primary sidearm I used until the conclusion of the main game, which is supposed to be engraved from the revolver I had purchased from the Valentine gun store (or was it the one in Rhodes?). The Metro dragon I wanted to make very skinny and used Nils' and Zantor's designs as reference for his look. His gear I simply looked up pictures of Metro 2033 character models and drew what I felt I wanted the dragon to be wearing over his clothing. He's holding a clip of 5.54mm cartridges, a reference to how the people of the Moscow Metro use military-grade ammunition as currency in the world of the series. The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. dragon I had wearing a Sunrise suit and holding a guitar, his build I based off of some of the fatter dragons in Spyro 1 such as Devlin and Argus. And he's clutching a bottle of Cossack vodka in his other hand, referencing how the drink serves as a cheap anti-radiation antidote in the hellish land of the Zone.                    

[saursart]

Inspired by playing Red Dead Redemption 2 throughout January and February, it’s a depiction of a gaboon viper Texas Ranger dismounting from his ostrich and visiting a draconic homestead near the settlement of Rye in the Republic’s New Mexico state. I plan to do a whole story centered around this character in the near-future, when I have the motivation and the right ideas to actually write plot out where each chapter would go.

[saursart]

An M4 Shersar barrel crew of the 2nd “Hell on Wheels” Armored Division that’s stopped along the Truckee River through Emigrant Pass into California Proper. The M4 of this world is a far-different beast than the one we’re all familiar with, having a smaller profile and being based more off of the T42/T49 GMC.

[saursart]

A depiction of a character within the APW world, a Pyroraptor rocket scientist by the name of Ulrich Achtenberg, at the Peenemunde Army Research Center with three others in front of several A4 rockets. The rockets are to be sent off to sent off to launch sites in Westphalia-Rhineland and the Bavarian Palatinate, with the objective of striking Communard industrial and military targets in Lorraine and occupied Belgium.

[saursart]

Felt like drawing an anthrofied Blue after seeing Fallen Kingdom on July 3rd, using some other peoples' artwork of anthro Blue as inspiration for her particular attire here. Finding a good reference for her pose and attire was a real pain in the ass, as a lot of the stock photos I found used the wrong shorts and tops, emphasizing gym shorts and jean shorts instead of the khaki ones I wanted (in lieu of the shorts Ellie Sattler wore in the original Jurassic Park). And that’s not going into the tops, as a lot of those shorts pics depicted women in sports bras rather than tank tops.

Though, in hindsight, I forgot to color in the Rex skeleton and the tree tops on the Jurassic World logo.

[saursart]

Far from their land

As they made their stand

They stood strong

And the legend still lives on

Inspired in part by, yes, the Sabaton song (it’s a damn good song, really, I like their slower-paced songs best), I had wanted to draw my AH universe’s version of the legendary Lost Battalion. I had used the cover art for the TV movie made about the Battalion as reference point, with Major Whittlesey’s face hanging over the saurs (and wosars) of the Battalion. Here, the Battalion of the US 77th Infantry Division is stranded in the Tennessee forests, south of the Duck River and surrounded by Confederate troops, as the bulk of Union forces are besieging Nashville in the Fall of 1918. For several days, the Battalion doggedly held out, resisting all demands by the Confederates to surrender; several attempts to relieve the Lost Battalion both by the 77th and by other divisions sent by First Army commander General Pershing (the veteran Regular 28th "Keystone" and the relatively-green Volunteer 82nd "All-American") all ended in failure. They were largely unable to cross the Duck, due to Confederate artillery being placed within range of the riverbanks; the most notable of these attempts was one that ultimately cost the life of former MLB player and army Captain Eddie Grant, who died from an exploding shell on October 5, 1918. Finally, the Battalion was linked with a 77th bridgehead established to the east, near the town of Centerville on the 8th; a lone soldier, a Russian Jew immigrant by the name of Abram Reznik, leading the members of the 707th regiment on an arduous trek through the woods and over the creeks and hills of the Tennessee back country. They were able to establish a route for friendly troops to come into the pocket from the bridgehead and with these reinforcements, the Battalion were able to push forward out of their positions and force the Confederates to retreat south. With the river deemed safe for crossing, the rest of the 77th was able to traverse it and the Lost Battalion survivors were ordered back north. Of the 500 saurs who originally crossed the Duck, only 194 returned to the division's camp unscathed; several members of the Lost Battalion were awarded the Medal of Honor, among them being the commander during the whole endeavor, Major Charles Whittlesey (who was also promoted to Lieutenant Colonel as a result of his actions). In 1921, when the Tomb of the War Dead was dedicated in Silver Spring, Maryland, Whittlesey was designated as pallbearer; later that year, he disappeared on a ship crossing the Atlantic Ocean. It was believed to be a suicide, as a result of the trauma he experienced under the shade of trees in Tennessee back in 1918.                    

[saursart]

Something I drew after watching Fury back in late April, which I had gotten for Christmas a couple years ago but never got around to actually watching it due to being constantly glued to my computer (it's a habit I'm trying to force myself away from). It's a pretty good movie, even if it's flawed in the sense that it almost feels like the people behind it had multiple ideas or that they originally wanted to make an HBO Band of Brothers/The Pacific/Generation Kill style miniseries, but for some reason decided to make it a movie instead. Anyway, in that movie, there is a sequence where the main characters are helping to capture a German town and they're presented with a large group of soldiers and civilians who wish to give up; among them is the local Burgermeiser and an SS officer, whom the Burgermeister identifies as a man who had ordered civilians who didn't wish to take up arms to be executed for treason and cowardice. The officer is promptly gunned down by an eager GI and the town is deemed secure, allowing the characters to take a moment's rest from combat. So, the situation here is similar: in April 1945, several platoons of Confederate infantry, accompanied by armor, seize the French village of Vendeurve-du-Poitou, located to the west of Chatellerault, after encountering some light resistance from regular Army troops and Jeunesse Communiste armed youths. They round a large group of surrendering troops and civilians into the square in front of the Saint Aventin church in the center of town, among them a saur in the distinct brown uniform of a CSP Commissaire, acolytes of the dying Communard regime. After someone identified as the town mayor informed the Confederates that the Commissaire had ordered the hangings of various civilians seen in the area, one of the soldiers approaches him. A tiny horned serpent, dwarfed by the towering Neovenator, she sizes him up, the Communard glaring defiantly down at the dragoness before she hoses him with her .455 submachine gun.                    

One thing I have to mention is that, at the time I drew this, I didn’t have access to a great variety of colored pencils. So, the end result was that the Confederates’ uniforms look more like German Feldgrau than the classic Cadet Grey.

[saursart]

An idea I had right after drawing the previous thing, of a dragon flying over Lake Texcoco and Mexico City, inspired by a what-if map I found depicting what MC would look like had the Spanish not drained the lake. This took nearly a week just to find information and references before settling in to draw. It was a bit of a slog, but I am satisfied with the results (well, for the most part) and the coloring for the most part isn't too bad, as I think that's still my weakest aspect as an artist. The dragon in this case is Xochicoatl, descended from the interbreeding of Spanish dragons with native ones and formerly flying in the service of His Imperial Majesty, Agustin II and the Arma de Aviacion Militar during the Great War. It has been a number of years since she was mustered from military service, free to roam the skies over the capital, catching fish in the lake and hanging around the various markets and urban squares. A number of other dragons are flying about, while the Cuahtemoc Channel is bustling with boats; ranging from simple native canoes to barges bringing in fish and goods transported across the lake. I have to admit, listening to Arturo Marquez's Danzons while writing this and the description for the original DA page helped put me in the mood a lot.                    

[saursart]

Inspired by the music on the Tall Plains level in ANB (which is one of my favorite levels in that game, from a design and music point... although it WAS fun chucking Apes and golems off the startlingly-high cliffs with the basic Lightning Breath attack), I wanted to draw a Feathered Serpent Coatl-type dragon on a branch overlooking the Yucatan jungle with the towering temples of a nearby Maya city visible in the distance. I looked at pictures of snakes coiled around branches and depictions of Feathered Serpents to get a good reference for what I had intended. I decided to make the trees look misty, to help indicate this takes place early in the morning and so, I also used a photo of mist over the Yucatan jungle to get a good indication of what I wanted. The Coatl in Paleoworld is a species of Amphiptere, unique for being covered in feathers as well as its innate magical abilities, notably its ability to shapeshift into a bipedal (or, alternatively, a Naga) form and its limited capacity to control the winds with the wriggling of its serpentine body. It is a dragon well-regarded among the various cultures and peoples of Central America and widely-worshiped, from the enigmatic Olmecs to the opulent (and tyrannical) Aztecs; however, the species was greatly persecuted by the arriving Spanish, both due to its ties to indigenous paganism and due to competition for resting places with the dragons the Conquistadores brought with them to the New World. Today, it is a species protected by the Mexican and Guatemalan governments, and some have returned to old nesting grounds in the Valley of Mexico, despite the increasing urbanization of the cities (including the national capital) surrounding the greatly-diminished lake.                    

[saursart]

A drawing I did of the main character in a story I still need to continue working on, Princess Delanuvesh. She's the heir to the Imperial Talonan throne whom is always rebellious against her conservative, controlling father; after meeting a handsome German officer at a banquet, she desires to be with him and travel around the world with him. However, her father will have none of it and tries his hardest to keep her from leaving the Palace... so yeah, typical forbidden love stuff, rebellious princess, restrictive parents, a lot of shit we've seen in countless stories over the years. Now, I had to look up pictures of woman in 1920s dresses and jewelry to find the right one that would suit this character; I eventually found one that matched what I wanted. The necklace I modeled off of another model's picture as well as the necklace Ember from A Hero's Tail wears, so I decided to loosely model Dela after her (at least, in terms of colors).                    

[saursart]

Welp, after about a year of neglecting this particular blog, I have returned to post some more art to showcase my steady progression and experimentation.

A piece that was randomly inspired by this soundtrack music from The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning, which reminded me an awful lot of classic Medal of Honor games where you had to fight your way through an enemy facility (the Luftwaffe training camp in Frontline and the Japanese carrier in Rising Sun come especially to my mind). It just reminded me a bit of Michael Giacchino's scores for those games, as well as Christopher Lennertz's for RS/PA, for some reason (more specifically, this and this).  I guess it was the tempo, pace, and even some general aspects about the instrumentation of the piece. That, and you have to fight your way through ruins, against bushels of Apes and annoying-as-balls undead to get to Volteer. Anyway, the premise here is that, midway through WW2, a draconic SOE agent is inserted into the French Pyrenees, to investigate the site of a supposed Air Force facility near the spa town of Luchon. Disguised as a Communard officer, he discovers that the facility is located underneath a village on the side of one of the mountains surrounding the town, but is compromised. He thus has to fight his way through to get schematics for French prototype jet engines and aircraft, past the garrison of Air Force soldiers who want the Englishdrake dead. I remembered going through Google, looking up French winter uniforms from this period, using photos and artwork of the French troops sent to Norway as reference; as well as the weapons that would appear here in rough, crude form. Most notably the Astra 400 (the pistol in the agent's hands), the Erma EMP submachine gun (being used by the guard on the furthest left), and the Star Ruby (the pistol the beret-clad officer's wielding.                    

[saursart]

Artwork I originally drew up last month, but other stuff came up (like us moving) that distracted me from finishing it up until recently. Basically, it was inspired both by reading Winter Turning and by listening to Good Times, Bad Times by Led Zeppelin, as I felt the first half of that song could describe Winter’s life of always being expected to be better and his continued guilt over letting his brother be captured by Queen Scarlet, as well as meeting Moonwatcher at the Jade Mountain Academy in Moon Rising.

Funnily enough, I originally drew Moon getting together with Qibli in order to correlate with one of the lyrics of the song: “When my woman left me for a brown eyed man”. This was, of course, before I heard about the ending of Darkness of Dragons, and what a shitstorm that created in the fandom.

[saursart]

Inspired by the marathon of games I played last week while waiting for our new house to be connected to the internet, wherein I played Killzones 2 and 3, Spec Ops: The Line, and Dawn of the Dragon. The stark contrast between the former two and the last gave me this idea, of Spyro and Cynder dressed as ISA soldiers (who are ostensibly the good guys in the Killzone, although the background fluff puts that into question) fighting both Helghast and Damned 33rd (ostensibly the antagonists in SOTL, though that really becomes murky towards the end of that game) soldiers in a ruined Dubai mall, one of the set pieces in the early game.

Looking up the ISA guns (which are typical milshooter guns mixed up to look more futuristic, much to my distaste) took quite a bit of time, as did finding the right poses for them. For Spyro’s, I eventually based his off of the cover for Socom 4, while Cynder I sorta based off of a picture of a British soldier crouching against a building wall (at least concerning the legs, the upper torso I kinda did on my own based on miscellaneous reference images). For the Helghast, I just drew the tops of their heads, while the Damned 33rd, I looked up the poses for enemies in various COD games to use.

[saursart]

Part of my attempt to depict one of my personal favorite aesthetics, “Anthro characters in WW1/WW2/Vietnam War gear”, a depiction of Jewel from Rio as a combat medic in the Imperial Brazilian Army stationed in North Africa during WW2.

The APW Brazilian Army was much more proactive in the war than its RL counterpart, landing a twenty-five thousand saur force (coined the Brazilian Expeditionary Force, or BEF) at Bayona, Gambii, and participating in the Allied offensives that finally cast Communard France out of Africa. They would later on fight in Sardinia and in Northern Spain, helping in the liberation of the latter from the Communist yoke. 

[saursart]

Another older artwork of mine, basically my own version of the cover for Megadeath’s Peace Sells... But Who’s Buying? album with a Parasaurolophus instead of the skeleton guy. I decided to have one of his eyeridges cocked to indicate he was a sleazy businesssaur, though all it does now is make me think of Johnny Bravo. Honestly, I’m not happy with how awkward the Parry’s left hand looks or how I shaded his sunglasses, though I pleased with how the coloration (which was, of course, in imitation of the album cover’s color palette) turned out.

[saursart]

Inspired by Sabaton’s ‘Ghost Division’, this depicts several Panzerkampfwagens passing by a burning French Somua tank in the Hunsruck countryside during the German counteroffensive against French forces in the Spring and Summer of 1940.

[saursart]

“Turning Japanese”

Inspired by the classic early 80s song, this is a piece depicting Hadvar (a Wyvern character I had created not too far into my stint on DA) realizing that he had somehow transformed into a Lung Dragon, a la The Metamorphosis.