2 Point Perspective: Designing a Tank or Armoured Vehicle

For this project I had to design a tank/ armoured vehicle that needed to be drawn using two point perspective and shaded correctly using colour theory. I chose to design a tank.

What comes to mind when you think of the word tank? . . . a hulking mass of steel crawling towards its prey crushing all in its path? like an animal freed from a cage? Or a fast nimble box spraying bullets as it zips up and down enemy lines? Maybe you think of the old WW1 tanks sliding around on the mud and blood of no man's land? Or even something as extravagant as a hover tank gliding up a beach head firing its rail gun at enemy shield generators? the possibilities are simply endless. But for me having grown up playing with boxes of old toy soldiers what I imagine is rooted entirely within the confines of reality. Tales of soldiers and tank aces fighting it out on the battlefields of WW2 are my main source of inspiration. Sherman's and Tiger's battling over the future of Europe isn't just a figment of my imagination, it really happened all those years ago. And out of this great conflict emerged a new breed of tank, one who's sole purpose is to destroy other tanks. A mechanical monster that strikes fear into the hearts of men; the heavy tank.

Heavy tanks in WW2 are in some respects the easiest to design. The threat of being killed by long range missile strikes didn't exist. Aircraft weren't a great concern to tank designers because in the early stages of the war they only had to contend with ground forces. Helicopter gunships didn't exist either so the size, the noise and the amount of heat they produced was of little concern. The designs that emerged from this period in time reflect this disregard for attack from the sky. They were huge machines of all different shapes and sizes. This gives me the freedom to create anything I want as long as it looks convincing enough to be from this time period.

However instead of designing something completely new I want to build on the shoulders of giants by developing further a tank design used in WW2. One of my favourite tank designs from WW2 is the Soviet KV-2. It is a massive tank with a huge 152mm gun protruding from its box turret. The shells fired from this gun were so heavy that the reload time suffered during continuous fire because the loader would struggle to lift the shells into the gun breach to fire it. A tank such as this would be fun to work with. Plus I can draw it using 2 point perspective because it is 'boxy' making it easier to draw for a beginner such as myself. 

I'm planning not on copying the KV-2's design but evolving it. I need to look at what I can do to improve upon the design whilst making it strong enough to rip through other tanks from WW2.

An image of the KV-2 on the front of a modelling kit.

A KV-2 in WW2, the crew take a break from fighting and use the tank as a climbing frame.

Due to the nature of 2 point perspective this design will be simple. I will be more focused on using 2 point perspective correctly than small details on the tank itself. However that doesn't go to say that I will ignore the features of the tank. After all its down to me to design a new tank, not draw one that already exists.

First up is the tracks.

I have looked at multiple different designs of tracks and their suspension from the 1940's and my favorite so far is that of the Sherman tank.

I want my design to be fearsome, I think adding an extra gun to the tank would help make my design stand out.

Drawing my tank using two point perspective. I started out with the hull and tracks.

You can see here how I have used two point perspective.

I soon moved on to the turret and blocked out the guns.

My finished design, you can see how my inspiration has fed into my final design.

I scanned my design into Photoshop and began to paint it using a tablet.

I blocked out the base colour and changed the tracks to fit the design of the tank. The tracks didn't fit with the scale of the tank so I blocked in some tracks that are similar to those of the KV-2.

I then added correct shadows to the tank using the colour theory I learnt in lesson.

I then layered the base colours of the tank on top of the correct shadows.

I changed the colour of the tracks so they stand out more.

To make my design stand out more I placed a texture over the top and added the red star, this was the decal used by soviet forces in WW2. By adding textures and the decal it makes my design more believable.

I am overall happy with my design however I did struggle with using a tablet to paint on Photoshop. This is something that has become a recurring problem with my work. If I was to revisit this project i would probably alter my design more so that it doesn't look quite so much like my source of inspiration, i would also add the shadow of the tank onto the ground to create depth within the scene.