MOC: Gale Serpent Arises

"Was he greedy for power, or guided by higher though, or simply out of his mind? What made the old man, elder of the village, to leave behind the warmth of his house and climb up the mountains, to the moor cold and bare, which the cults of old had inhabited with ancient shrines, causes long forgotten? But there he went, and at the springs of the black stream he awoke what should not been disturbed. His fate remains forgotten; but since then has rain not ceased, nor have we had peace from the thunder and the lightning. The crops rot; The fields are flooded. Nothing will save us from the wrath of the Gale Serpent."

 I moved into Tampere two weeks ago. I left most of my creations (temporarily) behind, but I have almost all of my parts here, in my shared flat room. This is the first MOC built here. Well, mostly. Most of the dragon was built back old home. The base, however, is done completely here. The new building area seems working. It's probably even better, as I can browse reference material online when building.

This is entry for this year's summer contest on Finnish LUG Palikkatakomo Ry. The theme of the contest was Monster, with size limit of 64x64 studs. I had several ideas on the entry; I though of Mothman, and Bricklinked those Ninjago Morro Dragon wings for it, but the idea didn't fly; I made couple of different heads, but they somehow didn't work. So I went with a dragon; Colour-wise somewhat similar than the original set the wings was taken for, but more oriental. There are similarities with Dragon Dance built for the contests on Model Expo earlier this year, but I hope the differences are big enough.

The overall shape of the dragon went through several version. At some point it used 12 big insectoid wings, with six on the back and six on the tail; It also had four small limbs and stood on two legs. There was also a fish or beetle-style version with several body segments with shells, fins and wings, but it looked too random and didn't stay intact.

So I abandoned the idea of building the whole dragon and chose to integrate it with the landscape. I ended up making quite a long neck and a serpent-like body mostly with CCBS with some lime green stomach scales. The dragon rises from black waters, or maybe it's petroleum? I'm neither sure if those wings are really wings, or just arcane energy bursting out as the dragon emerges. It's up to you. Make your interpretations.

The moor developed quite nicely. Dark bley stones with olive green vegetation and some light grey shrines were simple enough not to draw too much attention from the beast. At a point I though of making a mini-scale village to make the dragon look enormous, but the idea didn't fly. There was also some snow, but I didn't feel there was need for another element. The Monster is the main dish here.

The photographs were taken on a balcony (I live in fourth floor). It seems to work nicely as a studio.

-Eero