top: first issue of Claw the Unconquered and below: Claw the Unconquered from DC's Who's Who Vol. 5
I submitted my redesign of Claw to Project: Rooftop and wanted to know what they thought of it. Here's their post.
As far as the design goes, I told P:R "I feel that chain mail and fur are cliche. I think that if this guy has some way of getting a magical gauntlet for his evil hand then he can also get some better more sensible clothes. So I chose a layered leather look for the shoulders and chest along with something like a kilt. I wanted his gauntlet to be more like it came from a suit of armor instead of something form fitting."
I later replied to some comments, "I was trying to be pretty realistic about this design. Imagining myself wearing it (sure I’m that fit), and also imagining it’s creation. I thought a lot about how it would move when he was walking or fighting. It had to be flexible and somewhat light, but not move around on his body. Hence the sleeves around his upper arm. Those keep that whole top part from spinning around his neck.
The materials would be made up of dark thick-ish leather and some sort of forged metal. Amongst fur and chain-mail, gold is ridiculously over used.
I was trying to avoid just putting him in furry leather strapped footwear, which is another cliche. That’s where the armored slippers came in. Protected toes, hard layered leather soles and open in the back to keep them from sweating to death.
The only thing I carried over from the old design was the armor on the calves. I thought that they looked cool in the original design and it worked with the layered look I was going for with the metal and leather.
The fang/claw ornaments are a bit over the top and probably the least realistic. I imagined the person who put it together for him was taking some artistic liberties. But he’s a tough guy and those claw rubbing on his thighs would probably end up being unnoticed."
