Post by Sulfurlix on Feb 11, 2016 18:28:01 GMT
Original, alternative version or a hybrid?
The Keekraie Oriental dragon is a subspecies of the original Oriental dragon.
Ears: The ears are not visible. The ears are hidden under the base of the horns, and are able to be closed when diving into the water. A Keekraie’s ears are very sensitive to sharp sounds, and they’re able to easily identify one being’s sound from another’s. They can become easily infected from water setting on their ear drums, and this can cause deafness in severe cases, but their healing abilities are usually able to correct this before it happens.
Horns: The horns are large and grown from polished, smooth bone from the skull that’s tinted brown. They’re very strong, and even sensitive on some. Grabbing at the horns of a Keekraie can be taken as a threat, a play at dominance, or–depending on the dragon–a playful gesture. It is best to leave their horns alone until well acquainted with the dragon.
Legs: The Keekraie does not have legs.
Body: text
Head: text
Whiskers: text
Large and noble, a Keekraie is often times looked at as a dragon of the Gods. Their beautiful golden scales, smooth horns, sharp white teeth, and elegant grace set them apart from the average serpent. Their size alone is intimidating. An average Keekraie dwarfs a human so much that their teeth are larger than even their head. This species has a majestic feel about them, yet they can be matched to many different personalities.
Visualizing your design
Some of you might have issues visualizing your idea and that's perfectly normal, not everybody sees everything clearly in their mind and this includes artists, so don't worry.
There are a few ways you can visualize your idea to help get a better picture of what you (think you've) created so far.
The first and most visual way is to actually create a visual version of it. It could be done by drawing it, painting it, creating a rough version in a game (like Spore for example) or even by making a rough version out of clay.
It doesn't have to be very detailed and your skills will obviously limit how detailed you can get. But even something as basic as a somewhat detailed stick figure could help you get a better idea of what you want your species to look like.
Another way which is visual as well, but doesn't require a lot of skill, is to make a collage. Cut out eyes, heads, ears, torso parts, legs and anything else you might need from existing art work and/or photographs and piece them all together to create a rough version of what you want. Doing this allows you to easily change small aspects for another to see how those would work, like changing smaller eyes for bigger eyes.
If you're still unsure about how this works, search for 'face collage' in Google images and you should get what the idea is.
Another and perhaps best way is to write it down. If you're creating a species for a story you're working on you're going to have to describe it to the reader anyway, so why not start with a description right now?
It could be a basic description, like the one I gave earlier, you could even use simple bullet points to get the point across, or you could write a fully detailed description, ready for your story.
Movement
Knowing how your species looks is one thing, but how does it move? How does it walk, run, sit, sleep, jump, attack and so on. It's a big factor of how a species will appear to the spectator, whether that's a reader or player of your game won't matter.
Movement includes the smaller movements, like facial movement for emotions or the subtle movements indicating nervousness, like not being able to stand still or clenching your fists.
It's a huge chunk of details to digest, but it's a good idea to think about this in the early stages, rather than trying to figure those out when you're actually writing or animating your species into your universe.
Sound
Another major aspect is the way your species sounds. Guttural? Melodic? Or maybe something different and unique? For inspiration there's a whole world to explore, humans alone can make a wide range of noises and there's plenty of animals you can use as a basis for your species.
You can also use less obvious sounds as the basis of the sounds your species makes, like burps, hiccups or the clicking sounds made by those speaking the Khoisan languages.
You'll likely also want to develop at least a basic language, but this will be covered in a separate guide in the future.
Subspecies and races
So by now you should have a pretty good idea of what you want your species to look like, maybe you already worked it out completely or maybe you still need to work out the finer details, but there's one more major aspect you'll have to think about, which is subspecies and races.
There's a huge variety of looks a human could have, ranging from skin color to height, hair color and size. So why wouldn't this be the case for your species?
Some stories also have subspecies, like the orcs and uruk-hai in Lord of the Rings, which is another aspect you might wish to add or at least think about adding to your universe.
Adding diversity will make your world both richer and more realistic. Unless your species only lives in a specific area of your world there's bound to be some variation.
Other aspects
There are a few more aspects which could alter the appearance of your species, most of which are related to its society, like wearing clothes, having tattoos and other body modifications and wearing make up.
Other aspects which could alter the appearance is a need for survival (camouflage make up), scars from wars and battles, potential remnants of wounds (scars, lost limbs, etc) which might heal only partially or regenerate completely and a bunch more.
Most of these aren't related to creating a species all that much, they generally develop on their own when you create the society your species belongs to and the world it lives in.
There's a guide on creating societies right here and an expansive guide on world building right here, both of which could help you with not only the further development of your new species, but also with the development of your world.
The Keekraie Oriental dragon is a subspecies of the original Oriental dragon.
BODY FEATURES
Eyes: The Keekraie has large, solid yellow, white, or golden eyes. These eyes emit low levels of light for the dragon to be able to see in low light atmospheres as they tend to dwell in caves and deep water. It can become difficult for them to see in very bright situations.Ears: The ears are not visible. The ears are hidden under the base of the horns, and are able to be closed when diving into the water. A Keekraie’s ears are very sensitive to sharp sounds, and they’re able to easily identify one being’s sound from another’s. They can become easily infected from water setting on their ear drums, and this can cause deafness in severe cases, but their healing abilities are usually able to correct this before it happens.
Horns: The horns are large and grown from polished, smooth bone from the skull that’s tinted brown. They’re very strong, and even sensitive on some. Grabbing at the horns of a Keekraie can be taken as a threat, a play at dominance, or–depending on the dragon–a playful gesture. It is best to leave their horns alone until well acquainted with the dragon.
Legs: The Keekraie does not have legs.
Body: text
Head: text
Whiskers: text
Aesthetic
Visualizing your design
Some of you might have issues visualizing your idea and that's perfectly normal, not everybody sees everything clearly in their mind and this includes artists, so don't worry.
There are a few ways you can visualize your idea to help get a better picture of what you (think you've) created so far.
The first and most visual way is to actually create a visual version of it. It could be done by drawing it, painting it, creating a rough version in a game (like Spore for example) or even by making a rough version out of clay.
It doesn't have to be very detailed and your skills will obviously limit how detailed you can get. But even something as basic as a somewhat detailed stick figure could help you get a better idea of what you want your species to look like.
Another way which is visual as well, but doesn't require a lot of skill, is to make a collage. Cut out eyes, heads, ears, torso parts, legs and anything else you might need from existing art work and/or photographs and piece them all together to create a rough version of what you want. Doing this allows you to easily change small aspects for another to see how those would work, like changing smaller eyes for bigger eyes.
If you're still unsure about how this works, search for 'face collage' in Google images and you should get what the idea is.
Another and perhaps best way is to write it down. If you're creating a species for a story you're working on you're going to have to describe it to the reader anyway, so why not start with a description right now?
It could be a basic description, like the one I gave earlier, you could even use simple bullet points to get the point across, or you could write a fully detailed description, ready for your story.
Movement
Knowing how your species looks is one thing, but how does it move? How does it walk, run, sit, sleep, jump, attack and so on. It's a big factor of how a species will appear to the spectator, whether that's a reader or player of your game won't matter.
Movement includes the smaller movements, like facial movement for emotions or the subtle movements indicating nervousness, like not being able to stand still or clenching your fists.
It's a huge chunk of details to digest, but it's a good idea to think about this in the early stages, rather than trying to figure those out when you're actually writing or animating your species into your universe.
Sound
Another major aspect is the way your species sounds. Guttural? Melodic? Or maybe something different and unique? For inspiration there's a whole world to explore, humans alone can make a wide range of noises and there's plenty of animals you can use as a basis for your species.
You can also use less obvious sounds as the basis of the sounds your species makes, like burps, hiccups or the clicking sounds made by those speaking the Khoisan languages.
You'll likely also want to develop at least a basic language, but this will be covered in a separate guide in the future.
Subspecies and races
So by now you should have a pretty good idea of what you want your species to look like, maybe you already worked it out completely or maybe you still need to work out the finer details, but there's one more major aspect you'll have to think about, which is subspecies and races.
There's a huge variety of looks a human could have, ranging from skin color to height, hair color and size. So why wouldn't this be the case for your species?
Some stories also have subspecies, like the orcs and uruk-hai in Lord of the Rings, which is another aspect you might wish to add or at least think about adding to your universe.
Adding diversity will make your world both richer and more realistic. Unless your species only lives in a specific area of your world there's bound to be some variation.
Other aspects
There are a few more aspects which could alter the appearance of your species, most of which are related to its society, like wearing clothes, having tattoos and other body modifications and wearing make up.
Other aspects which could alter the appearance is a need for survival (camouflage make up), scars from wars and battles, potential remnants of wounds (scars, lost limbs, etc) which might heal only partially or regenerate completely and a bunch more.
Most of these aren't related to creating a species all that much, they generally develop on their own when you create the society your species belongs to and the world it lives in.
There's a guide on creating societies right here and an expansive guide on world building right here, both of which could help you with not only the further development of your new species, but also with the development of your world.