Deinocheirus - Dinovember 2023 by Gayleontologist on DeviantArt (original) (raw)

I saw a photograph of a grizzly bear passing through a clearing in a forest right at sunset and the fur texture immediately made me think of depictions of Deinocheirus from prehistoric planet and paleo art. I really enjoyed making the backdrop for this one. I just love the tools and the feeling of drawing and painting in procreate - what a revolution!

For this series my goal was to finish one a day before going to my job in the evening, to transpose existing beautiful photos into paleo art visions, and to learn more about composition and natural backdrops - so I setup a few shortcuts to push these out like an art exercise. First I paint the backgrounds and a blurred foreground recreating a photo reference as exactly as I can and use the blue tool to really sell the depth. Then I try and find reference as close to the pose of the original subject as I can, I’m really no good at posing and anatomy at this stage so I often redrew someone else’s pose with small modifications to get them to fit into my scene. Then I try and recreate either the pattern of the subject on the original or find inspiration in another living creature. To finish I often added a photo texture or a sliver of the original photo into the in-focus parts of the backdrops to add a more convincing effect.