Gryphon with rider

[Pragma]

After a number of months, and a few hiatuses (hiati?) I finally finished the largest mini project I have yet undertaken. It's a depiction of my Pathfinder character, the halfling druid Witten Greenwood, riding his faithful mount Storm. The gryphon itself is inspired by a combination of a peregrine falcon and an ocelot; I wanted a small, fast creature and the patterns and colors of the two creatures wound up blending very well together. It was my first time converting something on this scale: I sculpted the saddle out of clay and putty, as well as the stump on the base. The rider is removable, so I will probably make a separate base for him at some point. Also this was my first time basing using things found in nature: pieces of bark and little acorns for the mushrooms. I'm very proud of how it all turned out!

 

 

 

 

Lots of progress pics and discussion in my WIP thread. Please share your comments and critiques!

Edited April 29, 2017 by Pragma

[Citrine]

I love the black feathers and the ocelot pattern!

[Pochi]

You did such a nice job with this! It looks so good!

[Glitterwolf]

This is an amazing job!

 

I've followed your WIP, thx for sharing!!!

 

The patterns are excellent!

[ub3r_n3rd]

Fantastic! I think you did an amazing job all around!

[Pragma]

Thanks everyone!

 

4 hours ago, Citrine said:

I love the black feathers and the ocelot pattern!

 

2 hours ago, Xherman1964 said:

The patterns are excellent!

 

This is the first time I've attempted a natural pattern like that. A few things I noticed are:

• Patterns on animals are more complex than I expected, once you really look at them carefully.
• Patterns like this are very forgiving compared with freehanding human-made things like patterned cloth, since they are so random.
• It really adds a lot to the look.

So it's quite a big payoff for a fairly low degree of difficulty.

[Cyradis]

That is the most rad halfling ever. Not too many halflings lucky enough to have such a fancy gryphon to ride! Nice work 

[Pragma]

6 minutes ago, Cyradis said:

That is the most rad halfling ever. Not too many halflings lucky enough to have such a fancy gryphon to ride! Nice work 

 

He is definitely the most rad halfling ever, and not just because he's my PC. 

[Chaoswolf]

That's an amazing conversion and the paint job just kicks it up another notch; very nicely done!

[Pragma]

 

6 hours ago, Chaoswolf said:

That's an amazing conversion and the paint job just kicks it up another notch; very nicely done!

 

Thanks! I have been using conversions and basing to practice my sculpting. I would like to slowly work up to the point where I can sculpt decent humanoid figures.

[WhatsEcstacy]

     So cool! I loved watching the work you did on sculpting the saddle. Awesome stuff! I also like how you didn't go the traditional route with the Gryphon color scheme. Really unique and interesting. I especially like the patterns you were able to achieve on the wings!

Edited May 1, 2017 by WhatsEcstacy

[Pragma]

27 minutes ago, WhatsEcstacy said:

     So cool! I loved watching the work you did on sculpting the saddle. Awesome stuff! I also like how you didn't go the traditional route with the Gryphon color scheme. Really unique and interesting. I especially like the patterns you were able to achieve on the wings!

 

Thanks, I hope I left enough detail that others can try it too. I was inspired by a poster on something awful (I can't find the link right now) who bought a cheap little bird from a craft store - I think it was a 1:1 scale chickadee - and sculpted the most amazing saddle and armor for the bird and mounted a dwarf on top. Mine wasn't quite so elaborate as that one, but I got a lot of ideas from it.

[InvisibleThumb]

Really inspiring work with this!  And so much to look at.  I'm gonna go look some more.

[Pragma]

Glad you're enjoying it. The spinning picture is rather hypnotizing.