Steampunk Myths and Legends Entry: Plinio Barraza

#1

Plinio Barraza is entered in the “Steampunk Myths and Legends” update: View Challenge Page

Latest Update: Work In Progress: Cronus in the blocked out scene

#2

ANOMALY IN THE MACHINE

I am finally getting started on this challenge. I had to get some work out of the way.

At first I thought of digging into my country’s mythology… there are some really interesting and wacky characters in our folklore; like a one legged woman that roams around at night looking for victims. But after turning things in my head and looking around on line I decided that I wanted to work with Cronus. Time has always fascinated me, and once I read the complete story of this god I just could not resist.

Note: I have some confusion about whether Cronus and Chronos are two different things all together. If anyone has any insights on this I would appreciate it before getting to far ahead on the project.

So I would like to represent in a scene the story of how Zeus was saved from Cronus by Rhea.

For those who don’t know the mythology (and I am no expert on the subject):

Cronus castrated and overthrew his father Uranus and later came to know that he would have the same destiny… being overthrown that is. Cronus and Rhea, his wife, began to procreate and give birth to a bunch of other gods but Cronus’ ate one after the other in fear of being overthrown until Rhea decided to swap Zeus with a rock wrapped in something in order to save Zeus from being eaten by Cronus.

In any case, my idea is to try to represent part of this story in a single image. The idea is to portray the ancient gods more like machines than anthropomorphic figures. Although there would be some kind of creature quality to them… in fact as of now they are working out to be a little like insect dragons or something like that. In any case, I am really not sure how to model all the gods in the end. What I do know is that I will have a scene with lots of things going on at the same time.

I made a sketch that embodies the shape I want to give these gods but I don’t have a scanner around and its not too legible anyway. So the image I am posting now is more like a blocking out of the scene (please do not consider this a model). What I would like you all to see is the main composition of the scene and know what your opinions are, how it can improved, or if it does not work at all. But in order for anyone to understand I will have to do some explaining.

Rhea is a sort of god assembly line. She has a conveyor belt and each god is taken down the conveyor belt straight into Cronus’ mouth. Along the belt, the gods are completed, given their props and brought to life. In my scene one of Rhea’s mechanical arms is switching Zeus for a dummy. I am going to have to model many gods for this scene, but I like the challenge.

The idea of blocking out the scene was to see how I could create a good composition where everything can be understood before modeling anything. As I was blocking out the scene I happened to make the snaky dragon things (small image) which I used to fill out the bodies of the adult gods… but later I decided to go for a more factory look.

I am specially interested in hearing what you all think of the over all idea and if the composition is understandable.  Do you like the idea, the title, etc.

I will probably make the dummy stand out (perhaps ragdoll / more organic) to call attention to the action taking place in that corner.

[size=1](NOTE: I cant seem to find the attachments button so I uploaded the files remotely… also let me know if they are too big)
[/size]

#3

OK… I could not upload the images for you to see. I will have to wait for clearance.

#4

OK just a few reference images…

I hope I get some comments… I am a noob working in blender.

#5

I think I uploaded the files incorrectly the first time. This is the blocked out scene, not the real models. The idea is to represent the moment when Zeus was rescued by Rhea from being eaten by Cronus. The idea is to represent Rhea and Cronus as a God asembly line with Rhea giving birth on one end and Cronus eating his children on the other. Along the asembly line Rhea prepares and gives life to each of her children. Please let me know what you all think of the idea, the general composition, or any other comments that are relevant.

I?m happy to enter this challenge (first time on CGSociety) and I wish you all the best of luck.

#6

This is the progress of the model of the head of cronus. I decided I would post progress as often as I could to see if I can get some feedback from the community.

#7

This is the progress on the first character… The textures are not the final ones, but just messing around.

#8

The model of cronus is almost ready… the most time consuming part is done. Soon I can move on to the rest. Materials are definitely not final, they are just aproximate textures to see how things show up in the scene.

#9

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