Steampunk Myths and Legends Entry: Damir G. Martin

#1

Damir G. Martin is entered in the “Steampunk Myths and Legends” update: View Challenge Page

Latest Update: Storyboards / pre-visualization: Storyboard

#2

Hi everyone!
I finnaly gathered my thoughts, I joined video forum cos I prefer motion over stills, and I have big intention of finishing this challenge, unlike 3 previous challenges before.

I have pretty simple idea to begin with, it might get complicated, but I hope it wont.
I performed little search on this forum to make sure nobody has started this idea already, cos it would be dull to have multiple entries doing same thing, and I found out that this topic is free.

Anyway, my idea is a tale of Sisyphus in Greek mythology, son of Aeolus and founder and king of Corinth. Renowned for his cunning, he was said to have outwitted even Death. For his disrespect to Zeus, he was condemned to eternal punishment in Tartarus. There he eternally pushed a heavy rock to the top of a steep hill, where it would always roll down again.

Im going to work around the eternal punishment in Tartarus.

Since Sisyphus was a cunning man, I can’t imagine that he would’t have done something to make his punishment little bit easier, at least in Steampunk world that is :slight_smile:

So, Im telling a steampunk story about Sisyphus which is building a machine to ease his eternal punishment.
Im not going to tell anything about the machine since the idea is to keep it secret, in the trailer, till he very end of it.

The trailer would look something like,

1. Sisyphus thrown to tartarus, being explained by the voice what is the punishment.

2. It becomes obvious to him that the punishment is to big to do it from day to day just like that with his bare arms.

3. We see him pounding metal, melting it, molding, working with melted iron, everything is too hot, welding, riveting… eveyrythign you can think of on this “blacksmith” subject.

4. In the end, we see some short shots, like in the car advertising, slick lines, shines, reflections, the machine is finished, but we still dont see the whole deal…

5 Final shots of the trailer reveal the machine, we see it together with sisyphus, making his job whole lot easier now.

The end.

Summary:

Two models with some accesories: 1 SISYPHUS and 2 MACHINE
two environments: 1 STEEP HILL OF JUNK (where Sisyphus supposed to roll his big piece of compressed junk ball up that pile)
[b]2 METAL FOUNDRY

[/b]Im gonna start collecting reference, and hopefully, shortly, I will have something to show!

#3

Just a quick sketch, before the storyboard art comes in.

#4

lol ! i digg your quick sketch :rolleyes:

your idea sounds good to me, and you’ve already a sharp idea of the trailer.
Good luck for this challenge Damir, i’ll follow yours, for sure.
:beer:

#5

Good luck neigbour :buttrock:

#6

My heart sank when I saw your thumbnail.

Just to let you know that I was doing a similar idea for the image category, but I guess that’s the way it goes.

Good luck with it.

#7

thx SWED!

maksy_ hvala, ovo ti je prvi challenge ili? Ako je , mislim da te ocekuje zanimljivih 2-3 mjeseca!

Hi David, I hope you are not changing the subject cos of my thread friend.
We are not in the same forum, and if we were, there’s nothing wrong on taking same subject,
I just thought, if I saw 2-3 threads going about same theme, in video forum, I’d probably have another go, with something else.
In other words, I would love to see another original attempt on Sisyphus in image category.

In the end, thx, Im gonna need luck where Im going.

#8

Hi Damir - no it’s cool. I just wasn’t sure how concerned you would be because you’d mentioned doing a search. I guess we would all like to have unique ideas but with so many people entering there are bound to be overlaps, especially with the more well-known myths.

What surprised me most was how similar our ideas are, although I suppose it is a logical progression for a steampunk Sisyphus to build his own machine to help move the rock. I like the idea because it brings something new to the myth and gives it a different spin, rather than just retelling the events. I think my focus is a bit different though - I want to portray what effect the machine would have on Sisyphus (borrowing from Camus). I would love to animate it too, making it into an endless animation loop of Sisyphus going round and round to give the viewer a taste of Sisyphus’s frustration :slight_smile:

I haven’t decided yet which idea I will go with. I think the 4 horsemen would make a more dramatic still image, and the last challenge I entered I already did an old man going insane :slight_smile:

#9

Hey Damir , so pleased to see you in this one too !

Can’t wait to see the eyecandy begin !
Best wishes for you

suscribe

cheers ,

-Zapan

#10

Cool idea. Have you consider of making it funny. For instance after going through great effort of making a machine that could push that huge boulder to the top of the hill, he realizes that he did not take into account a steam drop on the other side and so he plummets down along with the rock crushing his machine. He is back where he started.
Radovi u galeriji su ti super - jedva cekam vidjedi kaj ces napraviti.

#11

Zapan, thx, nice to see you here my friend !!
DarkoV, cool idea, I guess I didn’t planed humorous story, but, It might go that way, cos your suggestion sounds funny, and it could work…

Im just working out the storyboard and the character designs, I’l start posting as soon as I have something worthy to share.

Thx for droping by guys.

#12

This is a small composition of few sketches for Hades.
I have few issues with the design, Im still trying to figure some parts, such as leg and arm links that form tentacle kind of limbs, and the parts that are going to be visible inside, machine, and the steam tank attached to the rear.
I have downloaded couple of steam locomotive images to study from.

#13

Here is the model.
I want to put some decoration with Greek art patterns, engraving and stuff on his plates, especially his head and horns,
I also want to write this across his for head and his horns in Greek alphabet:
KNEEL AND TREMBLE, I AM HADES, LORD OF HELL.
SO if anyone can translate it and post or mail me this, I would truly appreciate.

Little bit more on the design.
Inspiration for Hades comes from WETA’s Balrog. Im gonna try and make this machine that could pass as a crossover between Balrog and golden trooper from Hellboy 2 and maybe Bender from futurama.
I have this fierce image in my head, I hope that I will manage to translate it on the screen.

#14

I made this sketch using couple of pics from human anatomy site, blended two figures into one, and played with liquify to get desired look.

I first started imagining Sis(gonna call him Sis for the rest of the challenge)
as this huge muscle guy pushing the stone.
But, as I started wondering, It became clear that skinny old guy would do better.
The viewer would be more symphatetic towards this old helpless character than it would be to some Hulk rolling some chunk of rock.
He is skinny and fragile , but, he has brains,(he cheated death twice) he was a king, he is wise and what not.
So, I came up with this image.

#15

This is a model made in Zbrush.
Low poly was done in 3ds Max, then uvw aplied, and finally imported to zbrush for detailing and making him look believable.

I still have few details left to finish, and the whole texturing to do.

#16

great sketch with liquify and very good start with the modeling !:thumbsup:

.

#17

OMG! I really like this stylise charactor you have here! can’t wait to see it move!

#18

[QUOTE=AIR]
KNEEL AND TREMBLE BEFORE ME, I AM HADES, LORD OF HELL.
/QUOTE]
[b]

ΓΟΝΑΤΙΣΕ ΚΑΙ ΤΡΕΜΕ ΜΠΡΟΣΤΑ ΜΟΥ, ΕΙΜΑΙ Ο ΑΔΗΣ, ΑΡΧΟΝΤΑΣ ΤΗΣ ΚΟΛΑΣΗΣ

[/b]Here you are mate :wavey:.

#19

Wow, nice stile on character!
And it’s an interesting way of sketching - I am considering to adopt it too :scream:.
Good luck!

#20

Amazing style! Especially love the hand and how they transistion into the wrist. Reminds me of Robert Englund aka Freddy Krueger.