Orcinus Ocean's sculptures

[Orcinus Ocean]

I have been sculpting since late 2014, I use super sculpey and since the beginning of this year, SS firm on detailed areas like the face, tail and feet.
I mainly make whales, but asides for a crappy Durodon I made in late 2014 that I don't dare show you, this is my only prehistoric animal sculpture so far.

This one took me exactly one month to make, in April.




The pose is meant to be her throwing her head up, which is why the trunk is not hitting the ground.

I looked mainly at African elephants for references in the skin, and they are much wrinklier than the Asian.
It has nothing to do with accuracy, no one knows what the skin looked like, it was just an artistic choice.

She has a bit odd proportions with a large head, so let's say it's a subadult.
The neck is kind of long, but that was according to how they're frequently depicted, though I don't know if the complete vertebrae have ever been found.




Deinotherium is often depicted with a short, tapir-like trunk, but I disagree with that.
If they had a short trunk combined with those long legs, they would have to lay down every time they needed to drink.



They are also frequently depicted with tiny, woolly mammoth-like ears, despite living in a warm climate.
They lived across Africa and parts of Eurasia, and I made her ears larger than an Asian elephant's, but smaller than an African elephant's.




How the mouth works and the lips meet is very speculative, and differs almost between every Deinotherium painting, drawing and sculpture. I made it like this so that she has a proper lower lip with the enlarged "teeth" (tusks) sticking out, instead of just dry skin hugging the jaw, as they are often depicted. And the mouth goes all the way down to the end of the jaw bone, it's not restricted to just the horizontal part of the jaw.



The base of the trunk looks huge, and I had trouble making this perfect. There is aluminum foil inside the base to make her head lighter
(the neck actually cracked shortly before finishing, due to the weight), and I had to remove a bit as it became too big, then reattach the trunk again.

It looks disproportionate, but look at Deinotherium skulls, especially next to elephant skulls - they are flat, long, with a massive bony snout where the trunk was attached,
while a modern elephant is tall, short and "cut off" completely by the trunk, not snout.

I made a skull out of clay first and put "flesh" on top of it, to make it as acurate as possible.







Worm poop doubling as Deinotherium poop.




Hanging out with my bull Asian elephant and female black rhino, both made this February in no particular scale.

[QuetzalcoatlusKing]

Thanks Kanye, very cool

[Lone Trike]

Great to meet another fellow sculptor here. Nice work!

[spinosaurus1]

awesome work

[Lanthanotus]

Impressive work, especially on the head, the most distinct part of that animal and in a nice pose.  If that was a toy figure, I'd buy it right now

[Libraraptor]

Excellent!  Very nice work!

[DinoToyForum]

Amazing work! I hope you make more prehistoric creatures!

[PhilSauria]

Yes, fantastic effort. As someone just setting out on sculpting I am always interested in seeing what others are creating. I fear that I have a way to go yet!

[Jose S.M.]

That's an excellent sculpt!

[Papi-Anon]

This is gorgeous! I love the detail of the trunk's creases and folds especially.

[stegosauria]

I don't know why Deinotherium is usually depicted with short trunk but that looks really strange to me and unlikely. You managed to create a more lifelike sculpt than any toy company or paleoartist.