CGNetworks Feature :: Reader Project
Making Undersea Romance
Jason Chan, 3 March 2005
When I am at the Academy, even when we're setting up or taking breaks in class, I like to draw some more in my sketchbook. I thought it would be cool to do a weird twist on a fairytale character. I actually started playing around with the Beauty and the Beast story. I wanted a beautiful human woman in love with some kind of hideous monster. I wanted a little shock factor to the image
I ended up with a sketch of a nude beauty gazing longingly at a troll-like beast as he carried her in his arms. That wasn’t enough. I played with various designs for the male creature and eventually came up with one with tentacles for legs. Then I thought the girl could be a mermaid. And that's where the idea for the Undersea Romance came from.
About Jason Chan
Jason Chan was a typical kid growing up watching movies like Terminator and Aliens and playing video games like Mega Man and collecting X-Men comic books.
Jason enrolled in the Academy of Art University of San Francisco in 2002 as a 3D modelling and animation major but transferred to illustration after being persuaded to focus on his drawing skills.
Since then, Jason continues to work on his Illustration degree while taking freelance work on the side.
As I said, this idea went through a variety of changes. In the final line drawing, I actually had the woman with legs at one point. Once I decided on making her a mermaid, the dilemma was how to pose her tail. I found that I liked the flow created by her hair and the tentacles and so I wanted to mimic that with her tail.
Unfortunately when I generated some dynamic curves into her fish half, it looked wrong. It looked like she’d worn a mermaid costume and then had her legs broken. So I played with the figure until I had something reasonably graceful, but reminiscent of what legs can do.
