This work is based around the story that I wrote in English, entitled The Uneventful Life of Fruehauf, in which a young law intern (who does nothing but work and correct others) is fired out of his firm and finds himself working under an aggressive baker, after aloofly wandering into the kitchen. The scene that this piece is inspired from is from when the main character, Fruehauf, ends up stuck working in the kitchen, and considers himself trapped; the baker has a chronic habit of throwing objects across the room for no regard for safety, so the main character is intimidated into simply doing what he is told to do.
In this image, made in Adobe Illustrator, the cat-like creature is meant to portray Fruehauf through its different features: the cat components are meant to show his distant mentality, the bee-fuzz and hummingbird wings are meant to show his work ethic and tenacity, the dolphin tail is meant to show his intelligence, and the garter snake scales and gazelle horns are meant to show his caution and desire to flee. The background is that of a fallen clock tower, to try and resemble how Fruehauf’s situation falls apart and that he is stuck there for what he feels is far too long. To create the creature, I traced different animals to get certain parts and fit them together based on reference images to place them logically. I made the snake scales separately using varying ellipses, and the whole animal recolored based on a pantone color palette, thus making no part feel out of place. I created the clocks using symmetry tools and the sort, and afterward resized them to make them fit the room. I used indoor perspective to make the walls and clocks logical, and then used ellipses to create the moon in the background. To tie it all together, I went through briefly with a brush to create the stars in the back, and also places dirt and mushrooms throughout using the pen tool. I finished those components with shadows afterward.
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