gems-of-jungle-moon

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

;A; aaaaaaa

she looks so adorable here. little pink gremlin <333

thank you ;;

felt like making some fanart for an old au i used to be suuuper invested in. this is @gems-of-jungle-moon's post-corruption pink diamond, and she's a cutie :3

+ bonus doodle

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

I'm pretty bad at drawing dragons, could I have a tip on drawing them.

I don't think there's such a thing as "being bad" at drawing dragons, to be honest.

Dragons can have such a large variety of designs, especially when artists, modern or not, imagine them as something other than your standard fire breathing reptile. Folklore can't even be consistent on what a dragon is. To me, they're not too different than designing a creature from scratch, whether or not you want to make it biologically plausible (aka spec bio). So I can't specifically give you dragon design tips because I use the same process for all creatures I make.

Instead, I'll offer some things I learned about creature design in general from studying animals and from other creature designers.

It all comes down to two questions:

What is the character of this design? And what do you like to design?

It sounds vague but hear me out.

Designing a character and designing a creature aren't that dissimilar. Because by creating a creature, you also focus on what makes its shapes unique from others as you would in a lineup of characters. Think of how you can identify different real life animals based on just the silhouette alone, and the features that give it that silhouette. For example you can tell a giraffe apart from a whale just by the silhouette, right?

What I like to do is make designs that give a good idea on how the creature lives, speculative evolution, and that involves a lot of research into animal biology. Evolution is the most unhinged creature designer, after all.

Ostriches and emus convergently evolved to be built for running rather than flying, and occupy a similar niche in their environments. But if you reduce them down to a single silhouette, you can easily still tell them apart.

Here's two of my own designs to demonstrate this same idea. The left I designed from bears, wildebeest, african wild dogs, and gorgonopsids. It's a pack-hunting species that lives in warmer grasslands. Its arms are also comparatively long for the rest of its body.

On the right is a polar relative, designed from a polar bear, a seal, arctic fox (summer coat), white tailed deer (tail shape), and basilosaurus (for the teeth). Compared to the first design, it's less lean and has more bulk for keeping warm. The ears are also diminished and the snout is way shorter. Despite that they look like they are related species from different climates.

Sometimes I tend to exaggerate a part of the design, such as the neck fluff on the polar guy and the length of the nose on the left one. Even small changes can make a big difference, and sometimes unexpected features can give you the exact design you were looking for. Don't fear ugliness or uncanniness in a design.

Because another fun exercise I like to do is take the body plan of a creature and stretch another creature to fit into that body plan. It may look ugly and cursed but sometimes that's what I want.

If researching anatomy and biology isn't your thing, you still have options. You can always apply chimera rules.

I've also seen this being described as "frankensteining", where you stitch different animal features together without much adjustment. This design strategy isn't invalid, but I don't prefer it.

I know I went with a standard "dragon" look for Pink (and the other diamonds' corrupted designs are getting an overhaul), but that's because that look happens to work for what I wanted.

An easy way to approach any of these methods is to draw small thumbnails in a sketchbook or on a digital canvas while zoomed out. With references handy of course. Being able to find distinct shapes when it's smaller makes them not rely on the littler details to be recognizeable. That way you can iron out the rest once you find something you like. And hands off ctrl+z/eraser (or use it sparingly). I know it's tempting, but try and resist.

I like to use a ballpoint pen for this when on paper, because it makes me commit to the lines so I'm not constantly erasing. I get no progress if all I'm doing is erasing. If I don't like it, I take what I like about the other thumbnails and move on to the next. This process whittles away the features I don't prefer. Notice the little note I left next to the dog in the upper right.

If something isn't working out, that's completely fine. Look at references, build your visual library. Don't get discouraged. Try things out just to see how it looks, even if you end up not liking it. You still learned something from that attempt.

Hang the code. Embrace chaos. Draw and design dragons how you want to.

And to finish this off:

Don't compare yourself to others and let that make you feel bad about your art. In fact, stop comparing altogether. It's okay to be inspired, but you are on your own artistic journey. Give yourself credit for your own progress and let that motivate you.

I see too many people do this, especially when they have every reason to feel good about the stuff they made.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

I'm pretty bad at drawing dragons, could I have a tip on drawing them.

I don't think there's such a thing as "being bad" at drawing dragons, to be honest.

Dragons can have such a large variety of designs, especially when artists, modern or not, imagine them as something other than your standard fire breathing reptile. Folklore can't even be consistent on what a dragon is. To me, they're not too different than designing a creature from scratch, whether or not you want to make it biologically plausible (aka spec bio). So I can't specifically give you dragon design tips because I use the same process for all creatures I make.

Instead, I'll offer some things I learned about creature design in general from studying animals and from other creature designers.

It all comes down to two questions:

What is the character of this design? And what do you like to design?

It sounds vague but hear me out.

Designing a character and designing a creature aren't that dissimilar. Because by creating a creature, you also focus on what makes its shapes unique from others as you would in a lineup of characters. Think of how you can identify different real life animals based on just the silhouette alone, and the features that give it that silhouette. For example you can tell a giraffe apart from a whale just by the silhouette, right?

What I like to do is make designs that give a good idea on how the creature lives, speculative evolution, and that involves a lot of research into animal biology. Evolution is the most unhinged creature designer, after all.

Ostriches and emus convergently evolved to be built for running rather than flying, and occupy a similar niche in their environments. But if you reduce them down to a single silhouette, you can easily still tell them apart.

Here's two of my own designs to demonstrate this same idea. The left I designed from bears, wildebeest, african wild dogs, and gorgonopsids. It's a pack-hunting species that lives in warmer grasslands. Its arms are also comparatively long for the rest of its body.

On the right is a polar relative, designed from a polar bear, a seal, arctic fox (summer coat), white tailed deer (tail shape), and basilosaurus (for the teeth). Compared to the first design, it's less lean and has more bulk for keeping warm. The ears are also diminished and the snout is way shorter. Despite that they look like they are related species from different climates.

Sometimes I tend to exaggerate a part of the design, such as the neck fluff on the polar guy and the length of the nose on the left one. Even small changes can make a big difference, and sometimes unexpected features can give you the exact design you were looking for. Don't fear ugliness or uncanniness in a design.

Because another fun exercise I like to do is take the body plan of a creature and stretch another creature to fit into that body plan. It may look ugly and cursed but sometimes that's what I want.

If researching anatomy and biology isn't your thing, you still have options. You can always apply chimera rules.

I've also seen this being described as "frankensteining", where you stitch different animal features together without much adjustment. This design strategy isn't invalid, but I don't prefer it.

I know I went with a standard "dragon" look for Pink (and the other diamonds' corrupted designs are getting an overhaul), but that's because that look happens to work for what I wanted.

An easy way to approach any of these methods is to draw small thumbnails in a sketchbook or on a digital canvas while zoomed out. With references handy of course. Being able to find distinct shapes when it's smaller makes them not rely on the littler details to be recognizeable. That way you can iron out the rest once you find something you like. And hands off ctrl+z/eraser (or use it sparingly). I know it's tempting, but try and resist.

I like to use a ballpoint pen for this when on paper, because it makes me commit to the lines so I'm not constantly erasing. I get no progress if all I'm doing is erasing. If I don't like it, I take what I like about the other thumbnails and move on to the next. This process whittles away the features I don't prefer. Notice the little note I left next to the dog in the upper right.

If something isn't working out, that's completely fine. Look at references, build your visual library. Don't get discouraged. Try things out just to see how it looks, even if you end up not liking it. You still learned something from that attempt.

Hang the code. Embrace chaos. Draw and design dragons how you want to.

And to finish this off:

Don't compare yourself to others and let that make you feel bad about your art. In fact, stop comparing altogether. It's okay to be inspired, but you are on your own artistic journey. Give yourself credit for your own progress and let that motivate you.

I see too many people do this, especially when they have every reason to feel good about the stuff they made.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

You good bro?

I am alright. I graduated this year! But that means I am also very tired ;u;

Been preoccupied with other projects as of late as well, but I have been thinking about this AU a lot in my absence and how best to approach it format-wise. I'm still not quitting on it, but I think the comic format was just not the best idea. Things were more fun when I was focused on just making random art for the au rather than taking on a long-form comic alongside my other one. I thought I could handle it, but it just wasn't possible at the time. I bit off more than I could chew and with my other obligations and projects it was just not a good combination.

So, I think what I'm gonna do is do what I did before, just make art of the story and characters, and not put so much pressure on myself to do "content" for the AU and hold back things for the sake of "spoilers".

Sorry if that disappoints anyone, but to continue this project I need to make it a reasonable amount of work for me.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

@gems-of-jungle-moon i made fanart of the beloved silly dragon :33 i love her a lot

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

Silence. She is performing a very complicated call.

(corrupted pink by @gems-of-jungle-moon)

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

would you mind if we used your mask concept in our own au's? :o it's such a cool idea.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

I'm confused

yellow said that pink didn't wander but shes hanging out with off colors

Yeah, she lied to White. The most effective way to tell a lie is to mix it with the truth. Or something :p

They expected her to go and find them when she emerged, but she never did. As far as White knows, they went to the site and found her there. Technically they still went to look for her so there's some truth to what she said. Yellow doesn't want to risk anger White by mentioning Off Colors were involved.

I'm afraid it's less clear cause I've been on hiatus for a while, and so haven't made it more obvious it was a lie :'v

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

What Nexus, fulcrum and gem mimic mean in your AU?

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

What Nexus, fulcrum and gem mimic mean in your AU?

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

Hold friend gently

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

::::AZ-0080FF

Or “Az” for short.

She’s a gem character I’ve kept secret for a long time, but lately I want to show more of what I’ve got planned for this au. Keeping secrets has led to me not sharing as much.

I don’t have much else to say about her that won’t be massive spoilers. :3c So for now I’ll leave you with this.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

Some work I did on conceptualising Homeworld’s wasteland.

I have a lot planned for the history of this planet.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

In line with the gem speak synthesizer ask, for some reason any time the gems speak I keep thinking of the dancing cockroach meme

What mimic powers were meant for.

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

Why does Homeworld have a wasteland?

Homeworld's operations are so widespread across planets, their home base doesn't take up the entirety of this one. So you get this big chunk of empty land filled with chasms and canyons, fossilized forests, dried oceans and rivers, etc.

I'm doing a lot with how much wasn't said about the history of homeworld and gems, and let's just say this isn't where gems were first created :3c

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

::::Injector Concepts

Sketches I did for the injector seen in Canyon pg 2.

Decided to go with a design after boll weevils, since their life cycle is very similar to what injectors do in canon. All while sticking with the bug motif c:

[gems-of-jungle-moon]

::::Injector Concepts

Sketches I did for the injector seen in Canyon pg 2.

Decided to go with a design after boll weevils, since their life cycle is very similar to what injectors do in canon. All while sticking with the bug motif c: