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The sideview
I drew, from which the Lucky Dragon was created.
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After the original Rabbit
model had received some positive feedback, I wanted to follow
up one year later with a dragon for the Year of the Dragon, that
was 2012. In comparison, the dragon was a much bigger challenge,
as the body itself already would need to be more complex. At the
time I hadn't started to learn 3D-software yet, as the Chicken
was the first model on this website to be created with Sketchup.
To use as a reference, I drew a sideview, which already had the
necessary sections drawn in. I did not have a top and front view.
Using this, I created the model by hand as I had done with the Rabbit.
I then took it apart and flattened the parts to scan them.
At the time this is written, the photos of this prototype have
fallen prey to a trashed harddrive and it remains unclear whether
they can be recovered. If they can be recovered I am going to update
this, but there is little hope.
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| The
4th testbuild with legs for standing version on the right and
legs for flying version on the left side. |
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The
4th testbuild after the legs of the flying version had been
replaced with standing legs. First full build of the model. |
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Before the Chinese New
Year that year I actually had quite a lot other things to do and
did not have time to finish the model, although the basic parts
had been drawn on the computer and a successful first testbuild
had been done.
But the model needed so many adjustments, as the model parts
drawn from the scanned hand-built parts are usually not 100% accurate,
especially as they need to be mirrored, while the hand-built can
never be that accurate. As time ran out, I gave up on the model
after the second test build, but keeping in mind, that I may be
able to finish it for the next Year of the Dragon, 12 years later.
The development went into a deep sleep for very long.
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| The
4th testbuild seen from the front. |
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Closeup
of the head. |
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Funnily, the
first two testbuilds were still literally toothless. I can't follow
up on when this was done, but an image is left of the head, which
was photographed to create the teeth, this image is dated on the
computer as of 2019. In March 2020, after having returned to China
and going through lockdowns during the CoViD-epidemic, I finally
started to work again on the dragon. The third testbuild was still
toothless, but it was the first to get the spine right. On previous
testbuilds, not only did the spine not align with the body and had
to be adjusted, but it also didn't hold, so in the third testbuild,
I added the tabs to the spine and it worked well.
The most important testbuild was the 4th one. This added the teeth
and the former. Allover, small inaccuracies were ironed out. The
4th was the only full testbuild. I also used it to create some preview
picture of the flying version, where I actually photoshopped in
the legs in flying position as I had only built them on one side.
But afterwards, it was modified with four legs for the standing
version. For all previous testbuild versions I had built only one
pair of legs for flying and standing versions.
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Preview
picture of the Lucky Dragon photoshoppeed from the 4th testbuild.
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When I originally came up
with the appearance of the dragon, it was largely inspired by an ancient
Chinese dragon toy (there is a photo of it on the info
page), in that it had a clean head.
When I was working again on the dragon, it occured to me, that this
type of dragon, often called Chinese dragon and sometimes also Asian
dragon, is actually the same creature as Fuchur (Falkor) the luckdragon
from the famous children’s book “The neverending story”, my favourite
book of all time. So I decided to create a version depicting him.
For this I needed to add a mane, as he is described in the book as
having one.
So I created the optional head details and also included a mane more
resembling the typical Chinese depictions of such a dragon.
Testbuilds 5 and 6 were basically largerly improvements on parts,
such as some leg sections, the claws, the teeth and the new optional
head parts. |
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| The
bodyless head of the 4th testbuild, with new optional details
added. |
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The 5th testbuild, which
finalized the former, the ears and legs. |
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At the end
of 2013, the model was ready for detail work. I had already drawn
instruction illustrations in 2020, but I had to add shades in there,
put together the instructions pdf and assign the number parts.
Then at the beginning of 2024 came a huge shock: Within days, first
the old MacBook the current files were on crashed and then the harddrive
which contained the backups also became unreadable. For a time,
it looked like, after waiting 12 years to be released, the dragon
model, which by then I decided to call Lucky Dragon model, would
never be released. After several days, I was able to recover the
MacBook and get back all files currently on that computer's harddrive.
The Lucky Dragon so in the end was really lucky, as in the event
I have lost all my old model files for all models that have already
finished production along with all my digital files from more than
twenty years of work, scans of photos of my childhood, scans of
all my artworks, that had been left from my whole live and kept
only as scans. Lost forever, but the Lucky Dragon has survived and
is thriving. Now it is yours to build and bring you luck!
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