Isometric and Orthographic

For this project we were asked to render a robot or a space ship in Isometric projection (which basically means all angels are 30 or 45 degrees, at least on the main structure). Then we were asked to create an Orthographic of a piece of that robot or spaceship.

I am sure you have all seen an orthographic detail or plan before. The idea is to show a face of the object (front, back, top, bottom, left, right) and then relate those objects by width, height, or length. In an orthographic there is no depth. And each face is rendered as if you were looking at it at eye level straight on.

This was a really fun project to work on. I have tried to draw robots in the past and they were almost always really lame. Not that this one isnt lame or lacking a nice finish but it is leaps and bounds beyond anything else I had done.

When we were assigned this assignment I was a bit worried because I was no longer dealing with structures in the real world. Which I was getting sick of doing, but I think I had it down pretty well and I knew I could draw a structure, I wasn't so sure about a robot.

After class I sat there and looked up robots, tried to think of what kind of robot to draw, did some sketches that all blew. So I was sitting there thinking, what kind of robot should I draw? 50's robot? 70's robot? A robot from the future? what inspires me? I was starting to panic a bit, when it hit me.
THE DARK TOWER!

Now The Dark Tower series by Stephen King is something that I just can never get enough of. I read through the books every few years (which drives the wife crazy) and not only is the story awesome, but the art that goes along with the hard backs is incredible.

Of course the Dark tower! So I said, I will draw a robot gunslinger. I went and downloaded some pictures of guns, pics of people dressed in the old west attire. You know the long coats, the hats, the chaps... etc etc. Then I started to draw my robot. After a quick sketch I ran into a problem. How would I draw the long coat? Why is a robot wearing a coat and a hat? should he have a hat? do the pistols come out of his legs like robocops did? Or are they built into his hands? Does he have ammo strapped across his chest?

I once again started to panic... I was out of my league. So I started to think more about the dark tower and I realized there was a robot in the books named Andy. Which the drawing in the books of Andy is not at all what I pictured the robot to look like. The head was all wrong. It looked almost apish, and I always pictured Andy to be a cross between the Tin Man from wizard of Oz and C3PO from star wars ( cant remember if stephen king describes him this way or not ).

Picture of Andy



Here is the finale drawing.


So I decided I would draw my version of Andy from the Dark Tower. I think I created a better head, however the body could be better. In the planning stage I had elaborate plans for the body, but as time closed in things began to simplify. Someday I would like to go back and redraw this and really explore more fully the legs.

My Isometric drawing was suppose to have a bit more detail but I was running out of time and had to start simplifying. But the Orthographic I think turned out pretty awesome. I chose to render the head of the robot.



The video contains some of the original sketches