#Project Ivilitium

[bazookaboi]

Ok even though this should be part of a sketch dump I wanted to put it apart because I thought it turned out neat.

This one is just me messing around with “should I give Ivilitium clothes, and if so what would they be like” concepts. Nothing canon.

Oh and random fun fact did you know that Niko can make a 👍🏼 with his feet? (The drawing is a bit wonky because I couldn’t erase lol)

And yes I did change his design a bit if you were wondering. Ears/facial structure.

[bazookaboi]

Background practice, featuring two Ivilitium aerius.

Probably somewhere in Colorado.

I didn’t give this much thought or time because the weird-ass artblock variant that I have had for… 2 months or so now isn’t letting my mind advance.

I could definitely do better. I must do better! The background only took me 2 hours and 40 minutes.

[bazookaboi]

Fellow spec bio artists- CONSIDER: draw your blorbos being held like the longcat meme. Or honestly any artist, I dare you draw your OC(s) like this lol. I want to see how long they stretch >:]

[bazookaboi]

B1ASHO: “Quick question: how often does Niko interact with other ivilitium? (Of any kind?)”

Oh boy, scandalously massive rant time. [As always take this all with a grain of salt because I am constantly redesigning this story. The drawing too because I was messing around with colours.]

This would definitely depend on where in the story’s timeline you are referring to… He has already seen Ivilitium before in his younger years, but these interactions were either hostile or with other human-raised Ivilitium. In that time he was around humans for the most part, though. Farther in the timeline, Niko is introduced to normal Ivilitium. Specifically ones from the Ivilitium Imperium (II or Imperium for short). He is mainly around Ivilitium after that. [I can’t say much more without giving away significant story lore that I would like to keep secret for future comics lol] … Unfortunately, even though Niko is eventually in contact with regular Ivilitium, He will forever be physically, mentally and socially affected by the previous human intervention that he received… and that brings me to that drawing above. :]

Most Ivilitium find Niko weird or uncomfortable to be around. He’s a little freak who knows an enemy language better than any of the ones spoken by his own species. In fact, he only knows English, and a pretty rudimentary one at that. As if that wasn’t enough, his literacy skills are almost nonexistent. The only Ivilitium known to be able of speaking a decent level of English are members of the Imperium, so this already establishes a barrier between Niko and a large percentage of his species. He can’t even communicate with non-Imperium individuals.

By most of those who do get to know him a bit better, Niko is considered to be too volatile and unpredictable for comfort. (This goes for human standards too). In the Imperium, being calm and collected is what’s socially acceptable… which is what Niko is the exact opposite of. There’s some significant differences in his behavior. Just for example, if provoked and expecting a fight, most Ivilitium perform a sort of “hostile stare down” with another before doing anything physical. Niko doesn’t hesitate in resorting to violence, though.

One of the more evident things that can be observed is Niko’s expressions compared to a regular Ivilitium… which I still need to make a separate post about. Firstly, he “smiles”. Well, it can look a bit more like a grimace, but he instinctively tugs the edges of his lips up a bit more, which is a behaviour exclusive to human-raised/ socialized Ivilitium. This would be fine if he would just keep his mouth closed while doing it… but that (sometimes) isn’t the case, with Niko showing his beak blades and gums in a very bad attempt of mimicking a human smile. His smile makes both Ivilitium and humans uncomfortable. Niko’s mouth shape makes his closed smile way too long for human comfort, making him look even more uncanny to them than he and the rest of his species already are. And for Ivilitium, his open smile makes it look like he is angry or hostile. Secondly, Niko uses his brow ridges a lot more than most Ivilitium. He also has a tendency to have a fixed and direct stare in neutral conversations/interactions with other Ivilitium, even strangers, which can be quite unsettling or even misinterpreted as hostile by the other.

Ah, and just to put the cherry on top, Niko also came out with some physical defects; most notably his lack of vibrissae. He is stunted in stimuli detection compared to other Ivilitium, which makes hunting and detecting threats more difficult. Another curious issue is that some Ivilitium have problems detecting his sex, therefore not knowing how to refer to him. It is unsure what causes this yet- but it is assumed to be some hormonal imbalance, intersex condition, or something else entirely.

But! Do not fret, Niko has managed to make one good Ivilitium friend who doesn’t see him too much as a sociopathic weirdo… Although that is probably because this individual is pretty messed up as well. Seen in the upper left corner of the drawing, meet K4. A neurotic, nervous wreck of a creature who was also human-raised. I’ll make a post about him too sometime.

—————— RRRRH B1ASHO I LOVE QUESTIONS THANK YOU

Uh, if you managed to read to the end of this monstrously-sized lore dump, here, take some extra Niko sketches as a thanks for your interest. :]

If I am forgetting something I swear I’m going to be livid.

[bazookaboi]

Greetings once again! Im creating much more traditional art at the moment, and is very efficient at SMITING the artblock out of existence.

Take a Niko wiping a nosebleed. Just because I can. This piece here still isn’t 99% to my liking, but I think it is worth posting.

Materials used: mixed media paper, HB pencil (sketch), waterproof gel pen (lineart), two coats of watercolour, and one coat of coloured pencil.

Close up:

[bazookaboi]

Just some school doodles today.

DRAWING I] Still trying to figure a better design for my Ivilitium aerius and getting used to drawing more realistic proportions. Headshot of one with short, spiky head plates. (Feathers???) I was also experimenting with their “teeth” arrangement. (Beak? Bony plates?) oh, and I was thinking about giving them tongue barbs.

DRAWING II] Simply my spec bio sona sketched in my more angular style. He fluffs up when feeling certain emotions.

DRAWING III] Niko in my angular style sprinting. He can’t move his “hands” upwards (dorsiflex) as much as a human. If you are curious as to why, tell me and I can explain in a separate post. :]

Oh, and also- I have a question for you guys: (It’s Related to my genus, Ivilitium)

Do you think having nares like in the placement shown down below would be biologically efficient?

Smells would still be detected more towards the facial area, though. So this still gives the appearance that they have nostrils in a more familiar placing to what we see here on Earth in many vertebrates.

[bazookaboi]

More practice. For just taking 2 hours and 58 minutes, i am satisfied with how it turned out, even though it’s only mildly rendered.

Leucistic Ivilitium aerius. Still debating on how to construct the “teeth”/bony plate structure.

[bazookaboi]

Uhhh idk just a concept of lil dude to feed you guys for now until I finish some drawings and stuff for a few asks I have.

[bazookaboi]

Some OC stuff today, featuring my glorious steroid pigeon.

Must. Practice. M o r e.

I WILL DOMINATE YOU, SEMI SIDE PROFILES!!! WHATEVER IT TAKES.

[bazookaboi]

Uh idk silly Niko animation practice gif. Maybe I’ll make it into a fully rendered animation someday.

[bazookaboi]

New PFP! Let’s see how long this redesign lasts… o_o

I like drawing Niko fully baring his gums. And neon blue my beloved.

[bazookaboi]

Im working on a few things at once (including a few spec bio questions in my ask box that haven’t been answered for months o_o) so I uh… don’t really have anything excellent to post. in the meantime, take this little doodle of Nikolai suffering. More. :D

Oh how I love torturing my little steroid pigeon for no reason…

[bazookaboi]

SKETCH DUMP P2 this is just personal stuff. I did some fandom stuff too that I will post separately.

THIS IS ALL OLD EW I DID THIS A MONTH OR MORE AGO T-T… but I’m posting it anyways so that you guys can see my progress from very shitty to less shitty. currently I have made 27 of these. Working on 28 now.

Oh and those lion studies are just for preparation for my mega anatomy study project that I must do… soon, hopefully.

[bazookaboi]

Simple Niko headshot for practice. In my favourite neon blue colour scheme, of course.

I need to make a reference sheet o_o

[bazookaboi]

i can assume Nikolai doesn't like touch, more likely to bite a finger off whoever tries, but, would he let Grey hug him? and if they're friends when did they meet? where were the both of them mentaly when they did?

[*Materialises mini comic*] (Response is bellow)

Hmm probably cringe but it helps with story development so meh.

MINI COMIC DESCRIPTION: Niko hurts Gray’s feelings :( If this comic were to be part of the canon lore, (I’m still deciding) it would take place somewhere early in this story. As you may be able to observe, Gray’s text in her speech bubbles is a bit wobbly, as I tried to visually indicate that her English isn’t very good; due to her vocal biology not being able to perfectly produce the sounds necessary for human speech. Niko is able to speak English just fine, but you can see how he shifts from sounds necessary for human language to a noise that is biologically unpronounceable to us, hence the messy text and scribbles. (An alarmed, animalistic hiss).

ACTUAL AWNSER: “would he let Grey hug him?” Probably not… or at least not at first. I guess it would depend on where in the story Gray would try to hug him. In general, Niko considers any attempt of someone touching him as a potential threat- as just an attempt at hurting him, (the reasons why being very lore specific), and some touches in particular are even triggering… like what unfortunately can be seen in the mini comic.  so for Gray to be able to successfully hug Niko, it would take a long time for her to number one: gain his full trust, number two: shake off the uneasiness that he has with touch in general, and number three: get Niko to be open to building a deep emotional connection with Gray. (The last one is also lore specific lol) It also must be taken into account that Gray is pretty shy and kind of submissive, so that also would play a part in this. The reasons why they act the way they do must all be explained perfectly. Nothing here is without reason. I have made and will make sure of that.

if they're friends when did they meet? Heheh… that’s lore specific, but what I can confirm is that it’s early in the story. Hmm, and well, if I don’t change my mind, let’s just say that there’s going to be a few vending machines. I’m going to pretend that that makes perfect sense now.

where were the both of them mentaly when they did? Both were mentally like shit. Doing terribly. 👍🏼 👍🏼 

——————

Although this story is pretty developed character/worldbuilding wise, it still has a lot of years to go before I am satisfied and it is complete… I don’t think there will be too much of a change from now, but there could be some variation in the reasons why my characters are the way they are, and the ways they act in the future, so take this all with a very tiny grain of salt.

Also, I just wanted to deeply thank you for this question, Copper! I have no idea how, but it motivated me enough to take nearly 16 hours on making that mini comic. This helped me exponentially in getting closer to overcoming my current motivation/patience/inspiration issues!

[bazookaboi]

Oh yeah and here’s the first part of my in-artblock and post-artblock scribbles… THEY ARE REALLY SHITTY. I KNOW. (I am genuinely appalled at some of these)

Also (if you even read them) take nothing of the written lore idea stuff in these seriously, it’s just a bunch of jargon. Nothing canon. The drawings aren’t canon either.

especially that stuff in the last page- I’m leaning more towards male, female and another sex that is a second type of the two (like T1 and T2 females or something…) and oh god those drawings of Ivilitium are so outdated and… EuGh-