illithid in pencils

[gekitsu]

hey there.

i am not sure whether to post this one here or over in the sketches forum.
i don't consider it a sketch (looseness, finding ideas, arranging things, etc...) and i spent quite a few hours on it today. i tend to call it finished...

anyway, here is an illithid. it's a creature from the d&d roleplaying game that dwells in the underdakr, a subterranean world with enough of nasty and evil creatures. illithids (or mind flayers) are among the most evil and dangerous of them since they combine being sadistic and having strong psionic powers plus they look ugly :)
they stand about 6 feet tall.

http://www.polycount.com/cottages/gekitsu/pimp/illithid_web.png

tools used were a 3h mechanical pencil (0.5 mm) for all the skin parts and a 2b wooden pencil for th eleathery clothing part. i kinda liked the idea to fake leather texture by just using my sketchbook paper texture. :)

rip it apart, please.
i want to know where to improve...

greetings

raphael

[cucaracha]

ouuh yes, I love such cephalid monsters, I read Cthulhu once and paintings like that always remind me.

I think his body is a bit small/thin to hold this head.
I'm looking forward to the finished piece.
cu

[KingOfChaos]

Excellent rendering :) Personally, though..I prefer the eyes for my illithids to be a bit lower down on the side of their head and not so much on the front/top like you have it now. It robs them of their alien feel.

[gekitsu]

thank you both!

cuca: mosrly, the relation body-head is intentional - they are psionics. plus all descriptions i have read so far tell of a huge bulbous head.

kingofchaos: that is a good point you have there!
while drawing, it seemed a good solution for me to place them on the side of the upper tentacle's base, since there would be a eyesocket-like form anyway.
didn't care about alien feeeling enough ;)

edit: a mate in a german forum wanted to see a closeup, maybe it's interesting for some of you as well:

http://www.polycount.com/cottages/gekitsu/pimp/illithid_detail.png

[KayCustomz]

the shading perfectly done

[Wolvie]

Eeek! It's a mind flayer!
Great work on the illithid ;)

[davi]

very cool, i like the head modeling alot but i think you thought you could get away with just filling in the cloak.

it looks like you did two completely different styles and they don't really mix well. great head though.

[gekitsu]

argh, davi got me ;)

yep, you are right... after spending some hours on the head, carefully working not to let the flesh look to dark, too textured, just plain cheesy i-saw-no-light-for-my-entire-life-white, i didn't want to spend hours in the same style rendering lotsa repeating detail in the leather cloak.
since it was black, using the 3h would have taken me forever. probably, i wouldn't have it finished by now :)

so, out with the wooden 2b, my worthy ally for flat fill-in jobs and went on.

thanks for the comment on the head, davi. it really was the part i spent most of the time with...

[jester]

The rendering of the head is great, the leather garment looks very flat. Perhaps you should apply some shadings for folds and overlaps.

Jester