Tastes boring. Add some flavour.

[Griffonnage]

Yup it's what I was thinking for the rail placement, I think it help a lot with the bridges. You can make the monorail being under them and not on top too if you want to focus on it You just have to make the attached part on the top :

http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:A...clV1u3EjuPY5PF
http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:A...dNmsCdO7YwKTyg
http://p3.storage.canalblog.com/34/6...8/42158045.jpg

People may have enough space to walk under it anyway !

[Velocity Kendall]

Yeah like the Wuppertall monorail.

yeah love the new thumbs by the way, exploring ideas fast but in detail; thats how its done!

[Venger]

Yup, I was thinking of an underslung monorail too - give it a healthy slice of western steam trains. Mix up the tech with flavours of the old.
So maybe its a hover covered wagon (instead of wheels) pulled by horses going underneath.

Good job Jondawo, keep pushing it.

[Velocity Kendall]

Check out Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust if you havent already (its on a popular video sharing website in its entirety). It dates from after the time vampires started to look like wet femmy wierdos, but before they started to act that way.
it has a sweet futuristic/wild west setting, a "world that has moved on" if you will. vampires vs sci fi vs gunslingers. if it was discribed to mme i probably wouldnt watch it, bubt it does things with enough aplomb you totally go with it. good english dub too; obviously the subs is better but actually pretty well acted in English too. judging by the animation and the dub id guess its a US/Jap collab, but i dont know. anyway one of the main antagonists has a sweet coach and team of cyborg horses. theres also a wrecked gothic space station (which dropped my jaw), a wrecked gothic superhighway and lots of other awesomely strange design ideas that get burned into your brain good.

oh also, im a big fan of this super flat long range zoom type shot, evangelion uses them all the time, theyre easy to ainimate i suppose, but i think they look neat and are a nice way of getting the whole train in without it being all tiny at the far end.

[jondawo]

Alright, here's some stuff. I feel like I should apologise for all the photo usage but I just want to get my idea down. That's what concept art is all about right?

The underslung monorail make's a lot of sense. It also allows for some bridges which have some practical use. I thought the people could walk on top of the monorail track (enjoy the view) and even get in and out of the wagons from above.

Venger I really liked the wagon idea so I came up with a quick version of what one might look like.

VK: I actually have seen Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust though it was quite a few years ago. Once you mentioned it I immediately recalled most of the things you described. I'll have to watch it again at some point. Don't worry anime's are always awkward to describe to someone in words haha. I have a few favourites of my own here and there. Also your point about the telephoto shots describe the train quite well but make it difficult to show the environment since the train tends to take up the majority of the shot. It's a useful tip for when you want to show off the vehicle I suppose. I'll keep it mind.

[cfhd]

Definitely like that hover wagon. Giddy'up.

[Velocity Kendall]

sorry for continually drawing on your work. i just really like the stuff youre coming up with
i traced a horse. getting those legs right is make or break for any image with horses.

[Pavel Sokov]

I really like the additions Velocity came up with. I would remove the leather straps going to the horses mouth now, and instead use Velocity's white "shapes" as some sort of magnetic system that holds the horse into place. Also throw some modern elements onto the houses in the back to match the vehicle. Its going to be good!

[jondawo]

VK's sidebar is necessary so that the poor horse doesn't have to pull the whole cart by it's mouth. I thought I'd keep the reigns since they're still needed in order steer the horse. I didn't like the spikes on top so much since they seemed bit too aggressive.

I also tried to bring it back to the 'Covered' wagon idea and replaced the shiny smooth shell with a shiny cloth. woo. Not sure if it was a wise choice tho.

Feeling kinda depleted of ideas atm so this is all for now. Maybe more later. (sorry for the blatant rip VK I'll change it when I find a way to redesign it)

[Giacomo]

These are looking better...the use of photos doesn't bother me at all.

I have to say, the technology here seems conceptually a bit goofy. If the vehicle can *levitate* on its own, why would it need to be pulled by a horse? Unless this is supposed to be some kind of humorous hi-tech 19th Century setting...I'd imagine such a place would also have outhouses with flush toilets.

[cfhd]

I like to imagine that it is some distant future where there are still some old tech from the past (our future) that people use. So, in this case they may have some sort of hovering technology that can make things float but they don't have the means to propel whatever is hovering on its own. Hence the need for horses to pull the hovering cart.

[Giacomo]

It wasn't clear to me at all. If you're going to go that route I think the "wagon" needs to feel a lot more worn and damaged (i.e., cracked or missing glass, rust, corrosion) and the contrast needs to be more obvious between the "high" and "low" tech elements--lose the swooshy fantasy thing on the horse rig and replace it with the hardware that was actually used on a real horse-drawn carriage.

[cfhd]

It wasn't clear to me at all. If you're going to go that route I think the "wagon" needs to feel a lot more worn and damaged (i.e., cracked or missing glass, rust, corrosion) and the contrast needs to be more obvious between the "high" and "low" tech elements--lose the swooshy fantasy thing on the horse rig and replace it with the hardware that was actually used on a real horse-drawn carriage.

Its not actually my picture man. I was just saying what I imagine the scene to be. I'll let jondawo tell the real tale.

[Pavel Sokov]

Don't attach Vk's side bars to the horse, and follow his sleek shape more closely I think. The best part of those strange sidebars were how they are not attached I think.