Kaiju Revamp - The Giant Behemoth

This subject was chosen at the request of and honestly I thought it might end up being a bit boring on the redesign side after watching the movie. However once I started thinking about how to approach this I really got into it...much to my regret lol! Let me explain, The GB is essentially a carnivorous sauropod (I love how all dinos ate meat back in the day!) and while a sauropod form makes for a tremendously powerful beast it doesnt really fit the bill for a good design given its film attributes. In the film the creature had to very marine oriented and while Ive no doubt that sauropods could swim, they arent built for extended aquatic life. So I began to reference aquatic reptiles both prehistoric and modern/ This lead to studies of pliosaurs of all sorts, alligators, sauropods, turtles, the Sando Aqua Monster and even Fell Beasts from the LOTR films.

Suaropod paid homage to the original's build giving me a good base to start from. From here I looked at the Sando Aqua Monster (from Star Wars ep 1) as its a kiaju sized sea beast that hasnt fully adapted to ocean life yet. That changed my leg structure making me think more along the lines of seal locomotion. Combining Brachiosaur leg posture with this idea and some alligator thrown in gave me my beast's final body structure. Something that could move about on land but like alligators spent more time in the water. Pliosaurs gave me good ideas for the head and tail (certain artists have done mosasaurs with paddle shaped tails) and my study of the Fell Beasts was perfect for the thick muscular neck I had in mind as in the film it needed to be powerful enough to life many tons of steel and iron. Note the GB is only 70 feet tall making him more of a true dino in size that a real kaiju. Lastly the eye is pure turtle (red iris, brown ring, yellow cornea) who knew there eyes were such sinister colors?

So were does the regret come in? In choosing alligator hide for my scale pattern. I try very hard not to repeat textures if I can so I decided alligator fit this monster's nature well and even the original had of square shaped scales. Oy vey! Im a detail fanatic but damn thats a lot of scales and several variations along the way! Sometimes I get mad that I discovered the amazing work of Richard Delgado (Age of Reptiles - BUY IT NOW!) because his books gave me scale fever and apparently there is no cure. But now finally it is done and Im happy with it. Another kaiju down....and on to the next (as work permits).

Edit: I added a radioactive glow to the Behemoth at the suggestion of , Id have to say, I like it.