On Friday I had the great pleasure of going to a workshop with Terryl Whitlatch, well known for her Star Wars creature designs. The first half of the day was a lecture on animal anatomy where she took a design she had made and broke down it’s skeletal structure and muscle structure. The last half of the day we were given an assignment to design a creature from a far away planet that had adapted to a desert climate or an arctic climate.
I chose to design a cheetah like feline that had evolved to run on it’s hind legs much like a raptor.
After I designed the outside appearance of the animal, I took it to Ms. Whitlatch to see if she could help me figure out how the leg and arm muscle structure would work. She did a simple drawover that showed me where the muscles attach and how they would flex or contract and using that information along with some cat reference I designed the skeleton and the muscle layer.
It was a great workshop and I’d recommend taking it from her if you have the chance.
Also, in doing a post class search for her art I came across this: Tales of Almathea.
It’s an online training course in creature design. By registering you get access to a free lecture which is amazingly thorough. The rest of the lectures look to be about $10 each. Pretty fair price for the information she’s giving. I’d recommend this as a great supplement for anyone studying to go into concept design.
I’ve got her books and I certainly admire her grasp animal anatomy, I just wish that she wouldn’t stick so closely to Earth-like animal forms in here alien designs.
With an entire unknown universe out there I really wish that SF artists and film makers in general would trust the audience enough to show us something truly alien especially now with the limitless possibilities of CG characters. Wayne Barlowe’s aliens concepts for movies for example often stray into that area successfully but they seldom make it into the final film versions undiluted. The powers that be usually opt to show more relatable alien life, and nearly always humanoid.
I agree! But I understand movie making is a business and they’ve got reach a broad audience. So there’s this gravitation to familiarity.
Also, Barlowe is a huge inspiration and influence on me. I love his extra terrestrials book. One of the first art books I ever owned as a child. It’s now completely destroyed.