Ilya Shinshik

Many Dinotopia characters went through various stages until I was happy with them. The mountain farmer from Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara was one example.

Normally I try to catch problems in the sketch stage, but this time I was nearly finished with the transparent oil rendering when I realized that this character looked too similar to other characters in the book. Also, the potato he was feeding to the dinosaur looked sort of like a rock.

So I took the pose again and repainted him as a bearded man of Russian descent, made his outfit red, and changed the potato to a Burmese turnip. His name Ilya Shinshik evokes my two favorite Russian painters: Ilya Repin and Ivan Shishkin.

When it comes to such corrections, oil is very forgiving. Naturally, I had to restate everything more opaquely and paint white over the parts I needed to cover. But the change only took a day, and the first character was never seen again--until now.

Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara from Amazon
Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara signed from the Dinotopia Store