Today I have a new character design to share with you. “The Mammoth Bonecrusher,” is a heavyweight, anthropomorphic mammoth brawler character.  It was commissioned by Fanstratics for their forthcoming game and was live-streamed on Twitch. If you’d like to check out the VOD, you can find it here: twitch.tv/videos/1104189415

The process for this design began with some small thumbnail sketches to work out the overall shape and pose for the figure. After arriving at something I liked I went on to doing some reference studies, (to show me where I was going wrong with my design!)

After this, I cheated, (as shown on the video) and began drawing on a transfer of my thumbnail. (I hate doing transfers on stream. They are just so BOOOOORING!)

But while boring, they are also vitally important when working with complex figures and compositions and I was thankful to be working over one here.

After transferring the drawing down, I began laying in the initial pencil work very lightly with a 2H pencil. I do this to establish the details and shapes, without having to fully commit to anything definite. That comes next, when I switch into a darker 2B pencil to apply the final linework.

We finished the drawing in about 2 and a half hours on stream, with minimal disasters, mayhem, and lawn-mowing.  (My neighbor has vowed to only mow his lawn right when I start a livestream. Thankfully he didn’t keep it up for very long.) All in all, It was a very pleasant little drawing session!

And this is where we left it at the end of the stream! A battle-scarred, brawler of a mammoth. Thanks everyone who came to hang out and kept the chat lively. It was a pleasure!

-jg