Eaxaw: Artwork

Development of artwork, requests, suggestions, samples, or if you have artwork to offer. Primarily for the artists.
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Josh
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Eaxaw: Artwork

#1 Post by Josh »

Eaxaw Ships
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Some preliminary work for the Eaxaw. They could be for another race, but they were kind of designed with the Eaxaw in mind.

So I read the description and this is what I get:

1. A ship crashed in their backyard. I'm sure that whatever was left behind has a lot to do with their own inspirations. Borrowing spare parts from a free spaceship is probably not above them...
2. They are blind and they live in a hole. Kind of gives you a sense of where their priorities are.
3. These ships are built to facilitate the Eaxaw's doctrine of genocide. Or so I was led to believe.

Their ships were built by a race that really have no business whatsoever being in space: they're blind, they live underneath a desert, and they detest everything that lives outside their little world. Xenophobes If I ever saw em'.
The reason they have any space technology to speak of is due to a freak accident involving an extremely advanced ship careening out of the sky and falling straight into their proverbial lap.
Needless to say, nobody on board survived, but they left some their stuff behind and this is what the Eaxaw have to work with. A broken down piece of crap sitting in a hole. Now these guys were pretty ornery to begin with, and I don't think having their home impaled on a makeshift meteorite made them any happier. So like any good neighbor who gets crap thrown in his yard, they make up their minds to build a starship out of it and kill everybody in the general vicinity, generally making everyone else as miserable as they are.
Which is good, because that sort of gives me an idea where they're coming from.

Their ships are built from the same old rickety pieces of junk that they scrounged from the crashed starship. They copied and rebuilt their entire fleet from the ground up so to speak, So these ships aim to look dirty and ramshackle first and foremost. Pieces of ship and jagged lattice work jut out from improbable angles, with loose panels hang off their prows exposing the convoluted machinery underneath, all giving the impression that this ship should'nt fly (yet it does). The ship is an ugly, cruel looking hunk of twisting metal, fully appropriate to the race who built it.

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Tortanick
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#2 Post by Tortanick »

Josh, this is indescribably awesome, but I have to ask what the prespective for those pics are? To me most of them look like a side on view and rotated 90 degrees.

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pd
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#3 Post by pd »

Damn it, this just keeps getting better. What a nice variety, yet a unifying and expressive style. Definitely something we can work with. Very nice contrast, compared to the Gyisache ships. I like how you borrowed elements from shellfish, fits perfectly.

Tortanick: Those are plan(top) views.

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Josh
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#4 Post by Josh »

pd wrote:Tortanick: Those are plan(top) views.
Yep, dead on. But some of them could be taken as a side view just as well.

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Zanzibar
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#5 Post by Zanzibar »

Dude, you rock!! :thumbsup: Glad to see my idea getting some art work!
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Image

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Josh
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#6 Post by Josh »

Argh, I'm looking at them right now and now I want to change them. Why does this always happen after I post?

Is it just me, or do the ships seem less rickety and more slick?

I have some other ideas for this race:

Maybe the Eaxaw's home world "Elli" is the site of a ship graveyard full of old tossed out ships? A crashing ship uncovers them, and they get indignant that their home is being used as somebody's junk pile.
So they build their ships around these derelict vessels, and cement up the holes with chunks of dirt and home made machinery, and take it with them into space. Like a clod of dirt or underground hive with an engine attached. Little point prongy thingies jutting out... Recycled relics and dead ships lodged inside a big clod of dirt with an engine attached...

Eaxaw Ships
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It's really odd that a xenophobic race would want to use anything alien though. So, maybe they hold some sort of personal claim on it? A sort of finders keepers axiom?

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Tortanick
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#7 Post by Tortanick »

It never struck me as odd that xenophobes would use alien tech, they hate the people but have no strong opinions on the objects that they created, much like Hitler had no objection to useing Jewish money for his own ends.

As for the new direction, I'm not so sure... spaceships made out of one of the most flimsy things around: dirt. Plus a finite amount of derelict ships to reuse... also looking at them it seemed like they built the ships underneath the dirt rather than patched them up, and dirt dosn't really feel "Eaxaw" to me, for all the faults you pointed out with the first design (and IMO weather or not you want to change them, I'm glad I got to see them) they did feel Eaxaw built them.

Sorry to sound so negative, I actually think the idea that they "cement out the holes" sounds like it could have real promise but I see it a different way: start with a reasonably well designed ship, maybe base it on Advent technology, then crudely bolt hull segments from the first design style on. Might look great, might look awful.

Also rather than fixing up abandoned spaceships they could recreate them part for part because they have no idea how they work and thus don't change anything. Parts that were too badly damaged to recreate they replace with their own tech and since that's a lot bulkier they crudely bolt on an extra hull section to hold it. Same goes for any additions they want to include.

Alternatively you could improve the first designs, they are gorgeous :)

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pd
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#8 Post by pd »

Dirt can easily made as hard as rock. Don't termites do this? Clay can become quite hard as well.

Looking again at the first bunch, it does feel, like there is something missing. And yes, they do look quite robust as well. The dirt introduces a new material, which is great because you can now balance this against the machine parts. I favor the second bunch, but wouldn't mind seeing a mix of both.

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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#9 Post by Tortanick »

pd wrote:Dirt can easily made as hard as rock. Don't termites do this? Clay can become quite hard as well.
I'm well aware of that, but even then it can't hold a candle to metals or properly prepared crystals.
pd wrote:which is great because you can now balance this against the machine parts. I favor the second bunch, but wouldn't mind seeing a mix of both.
Don't get me wrong I think there is potential in the idea of mixing two separate elements its just that the choice of elements don't work for me. The dirt dosn't feel like Eaxaw, it dosn't feel like anything, just dirt like I'd find in my back garden. The spaceships that are supposed to belong to some unknown race feel Eaxaw (but not as much as the first set).

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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#10 Post by dissident »

oi, i started to model one of those ships (the top right from the first sketch), and now you change them completely. looks like you just don't care. :)

i'm not sure wether i like the first sketch more or the second. there is some decent stuff on the second one, especially the one at the top right. some apear a bit too clumsy, but the longer i look at them the more i like them. those ships look like being build around asteroids (yeah, i know it's supposed to be dirt, but ain't asteroids some kind of space dirt?), which would fit very well, as this race lives underground.

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Josh
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#11 Post by Josh »

Maybe it's just me. There's nothing wrong with the first batch, except that it could be the Antaran ships returning from MOOII if you get my drift.

The Eaxaw have two big things going for them ship-wise:

1. Their technology is taken from a crashed ship that landed on their home world. The story is very clear about this.
2. They live underground.

I would like it if at least one of these things showed through in their ships. The first batch doesn't demonstrate either.
Tortanick wrote:As for the new direction, I'm not so sure... spaceships made out of one of the most flimsy things around: dirt. Plus a finite amount of derelict ships to reuse...
Actually those were asteroids at first, I just didn't think they could find that many asteroids that easily, so I erased the pockmarks and craters. I figured a termite mound excuse would suffice just as well, but I agree about the finite derelict ships thing, that would kind put a big hole in their plans.
pd wrote:And yes, they do look quite robust as well.
Yeah, their non-dilapidated features were a big point for me :(
dissident wrote:those ships look like [they're built] around asteroids... which would fit very well, as this race lives underground.
Go with that. Asteroids with engines attached.

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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#12 Post by dissident »

like [they're built] around asteroids
somehow i feel the urge to apologize for my bad english...back on topic:
The Eaxaw have two big things going for them ship-wise:

1. Their technology is taken from a crashed ship that landed on their home world. The story is very clear about this.
2. They live underground.

I would like it if at least one of these things showed through in their ships. The first batch doesn't demonstrate either.
i fully agree. at least the second point is shown quite clearly by the latest batch. also even if the idea is not quite new i can't remember to have seen asteroid ships in any game so far. it's time somebody does it.

anyway, there is not much work lost, and i guess having 90% of the ship covered by rock makes modeling a lot easier. i'll try to get a lowpoly model finished within the next couple of days if i find the time.

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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#13 Post by Josh »

Don't worry about the English. It takes about 20 years of speaking it to realize you're still no good at it.

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utilae
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#14 Post by utilae »

Great Stuff !!!

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Josh
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Re: Eaxaw: Artwork

#15 Post by Josh »

Thanks...

Step 2 would probably involve getting some rough 3D models based off the ship sets.

While we're still handling concepts though, is there an Alien Race that would like to use ship set 1? Maybe a Precursor? Or another alien I can't think of right now?

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