Murosa
Murosa are alien lifeforms. They attempted to blend in with the Earth's environment by mimicking a flower. Later they saw how good humans were at traveling long distances so they mimicked the form of humans. Murosa need to travel long distances as their final forms are too big to be around other Murosa. This is hard for them though because their spindly legs make them stumble creepily, and the weight of their head is almost too much to bear which makes them always lean. They have tangly long vine limbs, and while those are good for warding off attacking animals, they find themselves tripping over them. Other aspects like the spikey leaf collar and crocodilian-esque form its flower head takes are meant to seem intimidating to animals too. They look panicked, their weird alien eyes are always wide. This aspect of them is meant to make them seem comical and clumsy, but their sharp features imply a predatory intent. A Murosa will travel as much as it can, eventually succumbing to the weight of its head. It has now fallen over and become imobile, beginning the next stage of its life: Mutating the local wildlife and plants. Subtly though, they don't want to be too obvious! Trees will develop little bark teeth, flowers will grow mouths ....
Murosa: Mutating
Once they are like this, they are basically a whole predatory ecosystem. Their once inconvenient long limbs now help them tangle up the wildlife and plants around it. They sacrificed the convenience of smooth movement in their previous form for the sake of being better hunters later. They feed off of anything that wanders into their ecosystem, from insects to humans.
Pose Sheet
Expression Sheet
Model Sheet
3D Model
I find it really interesting to think about 3D forms for abstract designs. The head was very interesting to model, I didnt think of the interior when I was designing it, but bringing it into 3d made me think about how the inside curves and the eyestalks connect. I see the value of 3D for understanding your characters more, even if its tricky to me!
Development
The thing I was really unsure over were Murosas "cape" and legs. It was challanging to find a shape for the cape that seperated the head from body cleanly & coherently, and retained an interesting shillouete that didnt obsure the body. A lot of my older itterations obscured it, which I didnt want to happen because the spindly limbs give it that aspect of creepyness. I thought the spikey design worked, and its close to the anatomy of a flower too. With leafs surrounding the central rose. As for the legs, I really wanted to give it cricket esque legs, but the extra detail cluttered Murosa a lot. Theres a certain level of abstractness I like in designs that is lost with more detail. I didnt think it made sense lore wise too; crickets are mobile, and Murosas are made to eventually fall over. So I thought the stilt legs fit better, theyre like wood off of a tree....
Above you see sub species of murosa hunting prey! They are same as a humanoid murosa, but copied dogs instead of humans. They retain previous ideas for murosa that i thought were fun but found challanging to make work in a 3d form: bodies made of vine to squash and stretch! And little leaf ears. Murosas head is so vertical so the lips sort of mimic ears, but I leaned into the crocodile thing heavier. Theres no room on murosa for fun little ears, but thankfully the dogs have got that covered.