The new pup for Tower Fall is coming along! Here it is alongside the younger pup from Slough Creek (about 6 weeks old) and an adult wolf. This is based on a 3-1/2 month old pup, which is the pups’ age in the first part of the Tower Fall episode. At this age, the pup’s body looks more like an adult, though with oversized ears and paws and gangly legs. The eyes have just changed from blue to yellow-gold. These pups are still dependent on their parents for food — but they’ll now begin to follow the adults on hunting trips and observe (though usually returning to the homesite before the hunt is over). They’re still vulnerable to predators and, without a den, will conceal themselves in tall grass when adults are away.
As you can see, we’re using wolf coat textures from the adult wolves for these pups. We’ll tweak the younger pup textures as needed so each pup will be recognizable as it grows, though some changes in coat color and pattern are natural and inevitable as pups grow up.
We’ve relied heavily on the International Wolf Center for reference material for these new pups — and they have lots of fascinating videos on their YouTube channel!
Pup Development
Wolf Logs
Videos
Next up is rigging: that’s where we create a digital skeleton, made up of bones and joints, that we then use when creating the animations that will finally bring the pup to life!