The Cu Sithe Project
Commission by Thomas M. Grimes
featured at Cu Sithe
This project was two commissions combined; a creature design based on a mythological beast called the “cu sithe” and an appropriate logo for branding purposes.
The Logo
The most important of the two commissions would be the logo - it would be public face of the client’s brand. I had a lot of freedom in designing this logo; the font of the logo had to lean towards “Celtic” cursive styles, but other than that I was free to design what I felt appropriate.
At first I really wasn’t sure what to do, and designed some preliminary logos using Celtic knots with an overlay of a silhouetted wolf head. I was unhappy with all of these designs, however, and that was when it struck me; some years ago I had been playing with a “puzzle piece” style that featured thick and solid shapes coming together to form an image.
Excited to try that style again, I jumped right into it, and swapped the focal point of the logo from the Celtic knot to the head of the mythical Cu Sithe, instead. The Celtic knotwork still features in this logo in the form of a braid, though! I really enjoyed creating this piece! You can see this logo in action on the client’s website and on their Facebook page!
I’m still extremely proud of the logo, and I’m very pleased to say that the client really likes it, too! But the logo was just one part of this project. The second part of the project was a commissioned “reference sheet” of sorts - a design for the client’s mythological Cu Sithe.
Above: the basic red sketch that formed the shapes for the body, with the more detailed lineart after the base was formed.
The first step to designing the mythical Cu Sithe for my client was to draw the animal that the mythos is based on! While the myth of the Cu Sithe varies greatly, my client knew what animal he wanted his beast to be based on: a wolf! Immediately I began to look up references, trying to decide on a good pose for the animal I was to design. I wanted a pose that wasn’t too dynamic, but also wasn’t too static either - something simple that could be used as a reference image, but also something that worked as an image unto itself. In the end, I chose a pose that reflected a wolf mid-walk.
Above: the initial lineart, edited and expanded upon to reflect the Cu Sithe my client envisioned.
Once the base wolf was done, it was time to make the necessary edits to try and bring to life the creature my client was envisioning. There was a lot of creative freedom in this process, but the client gave me some of the mythos that they had researched themselves and thought I could try designing: braids or braided fur, a long and shaggy coat, moss or small plants growing in the fur, and very big paws!
Many of these ideas worked well together and so I tried to add a little bit of all of them in the design. I was quite taken with the idea of the Cu Sithe wandering through marshes or swampier areas, however, and took a little bit of liberty with the idea of plants growing in the fur. For the tail, rather than simply make it long and shaggy as I had done with the mane, the feathering on the paws and some of the fur on the back, I tried to create a more “flowing” appearance, as if it was made of seaweed! I also gave the Cu Sithe a few braids in the ruff, but don’t ask me who took the time to braid this very big canine’s fur.
The very final stage of the commission was to design a colour palette for the Cu Sithe and apply the colours as necessary! Given that this sheet was supposed to act more as a reference, it didn’t need to be shaded in any way, and only required a rough concept for the flats.
Because the mythos for Cu Sithe generally describe them as green canines, there wasn’t a lot to work with here. A green palette would obviously be the most appropriate, but a flat and single green felt like it would be too boring. So I went back to one of the ideas originally presented by the client: moss, growing on and within the fur. Since I had already given this particular Cu Sithe a seaweed tail, it seemed fitting to incorporate other plantlife into the design in different areas. This resulted in my final design as seen above, with patches of lighter fur on the back that represented perhaps moss or algae, and darker patches that could be perhaps a different kind of plant or perhaps just genuinely darker fur. The final touches on this design was to give the Cu Sithe some striking yellow eyes - something that really popped against the green and really drew your attention to them.