[THREAD=35119]Click here to see my full Gallery in the OP of this thread.[/THREAD]
Swampert
Swampert is one of the coolest pokemon in the dex. It has such great typing and the most balanced stats in the game. This thing can single-handedly wreck even the best-planned team strategies. He was arguably the most dominant force in RSE, and is still going strong in DP. Swampert is so cool to play, I decided he needed to look cool too.
Reference
Here's the game sprite and Ken Sugimori's original design:
Sketch
Click the thumbnail to see the full original sketch:
Description
I was bursting with excitement when I first sketched this design. I sat down to do a "cool" Swampert, and very quickly, a bunch of slick elements started coming together. The end result is one of the most stylized designs in my gallery. I try to avoid over-stylizing the pokes so much that they become unrecognizable. This is probably at the upper limit of what I think is acceptable.
I pushed it because all the elements just worked so well together. I think it looks like a sleek, majestic water-beast. By making the head-fins lay back, I think it looks almost like the mane of a lion. The pronounced ridges on the fins add bulk. I interpreted the face-spikes on the original design more like whiskers. I accentuated the irregular-shaped mouth and made it look almost catfish-like. I really wanted to emphasize the feet, to justify Swampert's bulk and sturdiness. I added little webs between the toes, to give the impression that this thing is an excellent swimmer.
I struggled deciding on the coloring. I really hate the light blue skin on the ingame designs. I went with a darker blue, which I think makes it look more serious and intimidating. Since most people just look at the picture and move on, I've included two "Easter Eggs" for those of you that actually read my picture descriptions. I've embedded links to two recolors of the Swampert pic.
Here is a more "traditional" light blue skin coloring, and
here is the shiny coloring. I think the purple used for all water shines is just too awesome, so I had to make a shiny of this guy. (Personally, I like the shiny more than the main pic).
I really like the design of this Swampert pic. I think I did a decent job on the ink and color, but the overall design is really the make-or-break feature. If you hate stylized pokemon drawings, then this one probably isn't your favorite. But, if you are into "cool pokemon", I hope you like this one as much as I do.