I posted an edited version of this-http://www.paperdemon.com/artview.php/id/9171.html
"It had the head of a serpent, the body of a leopard, the haunches of a lion, and were footed like a Hart..." I'm using ref. pictures from a leopard, snake, and red deer. Which are surprisingly hard to squish together, and I'm going to have problems painting scales and spots.
OK- well, IT's too late for my advice, but I'll give it anyways. See, the thing about combining creatures is although a snake by itself is long and skinny, to attach it to a goat or whatever, it needs to get a wider base, just like any other creature of similar type. Now, I'm not normally a creature drawer- I normally do humans, but my red line has sort of how I'd draw it. Note how the legs ben backwards- horses and other fast running creatures are like this for speed and bouncing etc... Us bipeds bend with our bottom- they do all the bending in their leg. You didn't put in a ribcage- very important for organs, but easy to forget, The hind stomach area is a little iffy- I went for a stream line cheetah look, but lions are bigger there. Lions have hair on their tail too. A GREAT readilly available referance for the front legs would be a horse, and the lion is the most identifyable for the rear.
Another point I may put in is fantasy creatures like this sometimes blend the hair of the lion down the neck, and scales in areas cause it's ment to be an amalgamation, not a cut and paste creature.
The big thing with amalgamtions like this though is not nessecarily the accuracy of the part seperatly, but how tey work as a whole- the disbelief thing. If it doesn't look like a creature that COULD exist, then the likelyhood is the veiwer wont believe in it. That's why artistic liscence is SO handy
"It had the head of a serpent, the body of a leopard, the haunches of a lion, and were footed like a Hart..."
I'm using ref. pictures from a leopard, snake, and red deer. Which are surprisingly hard to squish together, and I'm going to have problems painting scales and spots.
Another point I may put in is fantasy creatures like this sometimes blend the hair of the lion down the neck, and scales in areas cause it's ment to be an amalgamation, not a cut and paste creature.
The big thing with amalgamtions like this though is not nessecarily the accuracy of the part seperatly, but how tey work as a whole- the disbelief thing. If it doesn't look like a creature that COULD exist, then the likelyhood is the veiwer wont believe in it. That's why artistic liscence is SO handy
Hope this helps Hope the pic goes well too