IanHubert
patreon
Rotten Dragon
🕑 Added 2020-05-21 03:43:05 +0000 UTC
[edited the pictures to not be the final full-res jpegs. I'd thought patreon automatically resized! It was a big post.]
(more images below)
Rotten Dragon is a small project I've had going for the past few years (not as much lately), but it's kind of a "back pocket" project, where I don't mind dumping lots of random effort into a thing, since I know I can fold it into a future project at any time.
It's a fake takeout franchise- kinda a transdimensional megacorp that serves suitably transdimensional food- that I've hidden in a bunch of different projects. At one point we built a practical location for Dynamo, and I thought it'd be fun to build a website (in kinda 90s html style), and that transitioned into an instagram account.
We hid a QR code in the scene, so if anyone ever scanned it they'd find this whole bizarre long-running social media presence, because we thought it'd be weird. We confused a few people, it was great.
But yeah, the first appearance is in the first episode of Dynamo from back in 2011 or so, sitting in the RV, and since then it's made random appearances in different projects.
Nobody's ever expressed ire at me appropriating a Chinese-style dragon, and I feel they'd be in their rights to be. I was more riffing on the prevalence of Asian takeout in cyberpunk (I could watch Harrison Ford order noodles all day), or Firefly (famously half the universe is Asian, they curse in Mandarin, but no actual Asian main characters in the entire show), and also because this wasn't really on the radar of Ian-of-a-decade-ago.
The instagram post descriptions are also kinda fun- mostly written in a daze at 4am right before bed.
Below is the page I'd print on transparent label paper and stick on takeout boxes, if anyone wants to use it for anything! (also the Rotten Dragon vending machine is available over in this post. I can't remember if there are any takeout boxes in it. Probably?)
Comments
Clint Shelton
Yes. Yes I am
Clint Shelton
Although it's a bit late, I wanted to add that I in fact searched up "Rotten Dragon" for take out the next time I would be in Seattle! Am I still disappointed....
Vortex 711
Pretty cool, that’s just like me using a reference from a show or a game, Especially V.F.D hehe
Zach Hoy
You have created an amazing aesthetic - so happy to watch it evolve
Ian Hubert
Man I wish!!!! Maybe some day!
Pete Burges
Epic. This is like Geof Darrow artwork come to life!
They are so cool!
Ian Hubert
Ah thanks!! Yeah this is wild, haha
EXEO
Absolutely mindblowing. Congrats. 👍👍
shonal bose
congrats in advance for 2000 members...pressure must be building up like crazy lol...
This is phenomenal
Joanne Tai
Lol, yeah, unfortunately the recompressing doesn't seem to be enough. Saw the first image for a split-second, then nothing.
Fes
Love this, Ian. I had a question I know you make a lot of your own props and things, but for kitbashiing, do you ever wind up using assets from other places that are prebuilt and textured? Like KitBashStore or KitBash3d?
Rene Kühl
Mega! Blade runner vibes ;)
Lukas Sprehn
Omg yes, I love the idea of an episodic Rotten Dragon delivery show. If you can somehow incorporate the bizarre "Delivered in 30 minutes or we'll eat it" policy into the plot, that'd be insanely fun!
Ian Hubert
Thanks, Jan!! Yeah I have a fondness for those old-timey websites. Or at the very least, more "handmade" websites. Everything's all fancy now. I remember back in high school we'd make random HTML websites just to insult each other. It was great.
Ian Hubert
Hmm. Same. I just replaced them all with re-compressed/scaled down images- but perhaps not enough?
Kennisoan
Deliver in 30 minutes or we'll eat it!! Now that's a deal!
Carter Burr-Kirven
Those particular rocks are a photo projected onto geometry (https://youtu.be/whPWKecazgM?t=373), so real life is doing most of the heavy lifting there! Rocks are hard in general, if you're going for photorealism I'd look into photoscans. You can get all sorts online for cheap or even plenty for free on sites like Sketchfab—unless you need a very specific rock or you're matching a particular stylized look, why spend all that time?
Joanne Tai
I'm gonna need to check on my laptop later. Images don't seem to be loading on my phone
Davide Gualmini
The rocks in the first picture seems so real, anyone may knows where I can find a good tutorial about that? I'm trying to create a scene in the nature but it is so hard to me making photorealistic cliff mountains
Mitchell Hoover
The lone food truck on a space rock gave me tingles.
Jan van den Hemel
I remember discovering this and the old-timey website ages ago. Man, those images are so amazing. I especially love the shot of that guy with goggles on and the blurry environment (beautiful lighting!) and the short of your girlfriend in a noodles cup (kinda David Lynch-esque!). Incredible work!
Carter Burr-Kirven
I love that so much of the lore and purpose of this weird brand is just to mess with people. That is, if you'll pardon my French, 100% my shit. I also love media with repeated unsettling undercurrents that never quite blossom into full-out horror, so a lot of my interests are being represented here!
Ian Hubert
Oh dang- I'd never heard of this before, this looks great :)
Ian Hubert
AH! That's right, on the side of the Negative Space cereal box! That's awesome! Yeah that wasn't even really supposed to be a thing- I just needed some sort of barcode to stick on there and that was the first one I found, hahaha, I love it! :D
Wow the level of detail not just to these images but to whole backstory and easter eggs is crazy. MAKE IT A THING OF ITS OWN!
I remember scanning the QR code in the BRAT music video and going to the Rotten Dragon website. I thought it was so cool thinking that I was one of the few people that saw it before the gates were opened.
Ian Hubert
Oh, no I feel you! Yeah, feel free to stick it in anything! Honestly I'd love that :D
Mike L. Taylor
Cool idea. Concept reminds me a little of Spider Robinson’s “Callahan’s Crosstime Saloon”. Love these renders BTW.
Ian Hubert
We've talked about it!! I always liked the idea of a brass tacks delivery guy, who's always delivering to these insane places with insane situations, but is mostly just doing his job (very "Four Rooms"). I tried to scale it down to a Dynamo episode (we even decorated my car- it's still covered in vinyl decals, hahaha), but never got around to doing it :)
Ian Hubert
Oh, that's great!! Man I'd love to play around in Gravity Sketch some day- congrats on the Oculus! And man of course! Feel free to do anything with it. The more people who add to it, the more confusing it, hahaha
Arturo J. Real
And to clarify, I don't necessarily mean expanding Rotten Dragon lore so much as I mean including Rotten Dragon-anything as a nod to your work and what it's inspired!
Alvaro Letelier
Love the concept. Feature film? Episodical?
Arturo J. Real
Once again with the timely posts! Picked up an Oculus Quest on Monday and started playing around with modelling in Gravity Sketch today. One of the tools kinda reminded me of a neon sign which immediately reminded me of Rotten Dragon so I ended up on your Flickr and using Rotten Dragon neon signs as a reference. Unfortunately, I'm not sure I've got saving just right yet. That experiment did lead to some more thinking, though, and I was wondering how you'd feel about others expanding the Rotten Dragon universe by including it in background scenes/pieces as small as the takeout boxes
