#sentinel references

[thecosmiccrow]

only finally time to post this. also this isn’t a step-by-step tutorial. im assuming you generally know how to draw already, this is just a bunch of references compiled together that could help you draw them easier.

SENTINEL REFS :3

extra notes:

dont worry about a bunch of the smaller details. sentinels are littered with them and itd take ages to draw them if you tried to make them 100% every time. just focus on the bigger shapes and add from there.

their eyes ARE octagons, not circles. that being said it does not matter how you draw them because octagons are absolutely fucking obnoxious to consistently draw. i know, i have a half-sentinel oc, ive given up by now. do not place that burden on yourself. the rest of their face lights ARE circles though.

the smaller two flashers are part of their head ridges. their eyes are on a completely separate layer, and have duller ridges atop them. sentinels just have a lot of ridges in general.

if you want to use real-world dinosaurs as reference, i would use Velociraptor, Utahraptor, Deinonychus, and Dilophosaurus as references, given that theyre all similar in body shape and structure. In the concept art, Sentinels looked extremely like the Dilophosaurus, though it got switched to being more raptor-like in the actual show.

I also MORE THAN LIKELY drew their tail wrong. So if you wanna figure out its design on your own, go for it. I just had to put something down so I tried my best, but it is absolutely NOT perfect.

Same with their colors! they’re almost a completely solid grey so it was difficult for me to tell what colors went where, so I just kinda put em at random in that first image. Doing something completely different is also good, since nobody can tell anyways :)

and on a final note, you technically do not have to follow any of these!! stylize them all you want. these are just references for anyone that may want to draw them more accurately :)

transparent sentinel base png: (MAY NOT BE VISIBLE IF YOURE USING ANY DARK MODE, BUT ITS STILL THERE!)

if it doesnt download as transparent, you can set the layer mode as multiply and it��ll work perfectly as lineart. this is free to use, I just want people to be able to make ocs easier :) i just ask that you leave the watermark in, and credit me if you use it, but you dont have to ask to do it.

(plus the image @1-800-hellyeah made for her sta.sh that i used as reference)

Happy dino drawing!!

(ps. you should totally show me any sentinel ocs you make :3)

[taimanzano]

Megatronus Prime, Prima Prime.

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(al final)

[messymerr]

Drew this because it was on my mind and i think it fits. A means to practice more on drawing bots eh, references are so important

Bonus :

I made Bee's speech a mix of the OG Comic and a clip of the Movie. Here's the reference

[lave-ium]

i <3 u not

[nerdfins]

When I learned Jon Hamm was Sentinel Prime, my brain mashed this fact together with my love of Good Omens.

[shardikart-blog]

never meet your heroes

[zenderstorm]

guess my favourite prime

if he’s also your favourite prime i think you should read my fic bro…

basically my thesis is that, lord prima, being the “Embodiment of Primus’ Divinity Itself”, has a sort of biblical-angel-not-knowing-how-to-act-normal air about him. Do you see my vision

Stemming from this original idea in my drafts:

bonus it’s narrated by sentinel so that if i ever get to the killing primes part or the part where he gets jumped by the primes in the well of allsparks we will have full view of his panic and fear

bonus part 2 this stupid thing

prima propaganda ! spread !

[velvetwyrme]

ur current fave tf bot? :0

request info

YOU SPOIL ME <33 I actually went and straight up span a wheel to decide who to draw because I was like. my list of current favs is too long.

Somehow it ended up with three Animal Enjoyers, which was really funny to me.

Also because he's still plaguing my brain, I tried to draw Sentinel from memory and. thats something I can do that now, apparently.

[cuppajj]

Jjjjust finished watching tf one and oh boy yeah that movie slapped real REAL hard. Transformers ily forever and ever and ever and ever 🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽

[bonesjaunst]

Maybe in another life...

And here they are without the gunshot!

Nobody talk to me </3

[kazel-04]

IT'S HIM (╯°□°)╯

An important person gave me two Sentinel figurines, I'm sooo happy ^^

This figure is so flexible, it's a pleasure to play with poses and take pictures of him

[jennyo-thewoods]

[Looks at Rhysand] …..call that a midnight snack.

[therexlare]

PAGE 2 IS FINALLY OUT.

I'm sorry it took so long but uh... I don't have an excuse, it do just be like that when you're ill 24/7. But I love how it came out and hope you all do too!

The final page will be out MUCH sooner since I now have a deadline, cough cough 29'th

[bringbackwendellvaughn]

The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe's entry for the Sentinels. Mark Gruenwald and Peter Sanderson did the research and wrote this up and the key illustrations are by Larry Hama (main picture) and Eliot R. Brown (interior schematic). I believe that's Bob McLeod art sampled from New Mutants #2 in those other pictures.

[immortalmuses]

Fanlore Info Dump | Sentinels & Guides

So thanks to the babe @leschanceux and feral encouragement from folx in the Dev Tea Room, I'm going to info dump about my very specific interest: the Sentinels & Guides Trope!

What Even Is the Sentinel/Guide Trope?

The origin of this trope is from a TV Show in the 90s (literally called The Sentinel) where one main character has latent hyper-enhanced senses triggered by being stranded in an extreme situation, revealing that he is a Sentinel. Through the show's narrative, we learn that Sentinels are an evolutionary role in mankind that has existed throughout all historical societies, manifesting in people who are biologically granted abilities to serve as "Protectors" of a community. This means Sentinels have (at least 3, sometimes all 5) exceptionally enhanced senses, which they can dial up or down as the situation calls for it.

But the thing about Sentinels is that their enhanced sense are a double edged blade. Yes, they're powerful and tend to have the advantage in a fight or encounter, but those senses can also present a significant weakness due to what's called 'Zoning' Or 'Zoning Out.' This is when the Sentinel becomes too hyperfocused on one single sense to the detriment of everything else, and is unable to pull themselves back. Zoning can also happen if they have a sense dialed up (like their hearing in order to track something far away) and an unexpected input overwhelms that sense (such as a loud explosion into a heightened sense of hearing). When a Sentinel zones, they are both incredibly physically vulnerable because they're immobile and unresponsive, and they're at risk of never being able to find their way back from their hyperfocus (which would ultimately lead to their death). This is where Guides come in.

Guides themselves do not have any canon enhanced abilities in the original content. In fact, they're technically fanon as a result of one episode in the TV show. But their presence is widely accepted as adopted canon in the Sentinel/Guide trope, and pretty much everyone writes them as the unique "other half" of a Sentinel -- if not uniformly empowered. Guides are the biological companion to Sentinels, possessing the ability to connect with a Sentinel on an astral or spiritual level. The original show used the concept of a "Sp!rit World" and "Sp!rit Animals" alot when relating the Guide character to the Sentinel character, a detail I don't personally adhere to nor promote because of its typical appropriative 90's TV shaman stereotyping. But the trope itself has moved beyond those origins to instead keep the basic concept of a metaphysical "soul-bond" connection between a Sentinel and a Guide. This means that the Guide has the ability to empower and protect the Sentinel's senses from harm. A bonded Sentinel/Guide pair are meant to be inseparable, and are often considered incredibly powerful because the Guide unlocks the potential of the Sentinel.

(Sidenote: As you can tell from my note above, the show had some good stuff, but overall it was kind of poorly done? Low budget, etc etc. The vast majority of the audience keeping the fandom alive were early era slash fans who saw the two main male characters and immediately built up fanlore around them. When the show was cancelled in 1999, many of those fans kept the concepts introduced in it alive by injecting this trope -- with improvements -- into other fandoms. We salute you, Fandom Elders! )

Tell Me More About the Connection Between a Sentinel & a Guide

The Sentinel/Guide bond can be written in a wide variety of ways, often tailored to suit whatever fandom the Trope is being applied to. But there are some universalities. Such as:

Guides can convene with the Sentinel at a metaphysical/transcendental level (sometimes interpreted as a telepathic connection), guiding the Sentinel to focus on or repress one sense over another and fine tuning their abilities in the process.

Sentinels with Guides have notably more powerful senses and better control over them. They are often consider the most powerful iteration of a Sentinel.

Guides can reel back a Sentinel's senses, even shield a sense from sensory input in order to avoid being overwhelmed.

Guides can also pull a zoning Sentinel out of their zone by giving them a lifeline to follow back to the physical world (note, a Guide does not need to be bonded to a Sentinel to accomplish this)

There are more elements of the Sentinel/Guide Pairing that are considered flexible to the trope, often applied in writing and art but not labeled as requirements. Such concepts include:

Sentinels and Guides are generally believed to have been biologically destined for one another. A Guide's scent will be pleasing to a Sentinel, for example. The sound of their voice is naturally calming and grounding.

Some Sentinels and Guides have full-on telepathic bonds, sometimes they just have a merging of souls and a sense for one another. Almost always, and Guide can sense what a Sentinel is feelings unless the Sentinel closes himself off from his Guide.

In some scenarios, Sentinels can let Guides perceive the world through their own heightened senses, so a Guide can experience those same abilities.

Sentinels can be territorial of their Guides, and sometimes just territorial in general. They occasionally get written with overlap in the A/B/O lore, where Sentinels are Alphas and Guides are Omegas. This means that two Sentinels tend to be written as kind of aggressive towards one another.

Sometimes a Sentinel/Guide Bonding includes the "bond bite' (yet another thing that tends to overlap with the A/B/O Dynamics in the writing). These are bites on the neck that seal the bond between Sentinel and Guide and can trigger the psychic/telepathic connection between the pair.

Guides are sometimes treated like coveted prizes in fictional societies. Sometimes the premise will be that there are more Sentinels born than there are Guides, and so Guides becomes highly sought after and sometimes aren't given much autonomy or rights (this has some similarities with the social dynamics of Witches and Familiars in our other verse)

Guides aren't always depicted as the weaker of the pair, but there is sort of an implication there. The concept is that while Guides are not weak, they are an Sentinel's weak spot. A villain to seek to control a Sentinel by taking the Guide hostage, for example.

Again, none of the above details are necessary to depict the Sentinel/Guide trope. They're just additional features I have observed in the concept as it has evolved over the past 20-odd years.

Let's Talk Power Sets

Sentinel Ability Specifics

Hyper-acute Senses of Smell, Hearing, Sight, Taste, and Feel: This means they can sense things completely indiscernible to regular humans, sometimes miles away in different locations or behind seemingly impenetrable barriers. Examples: They can hear the heartbeats of goons in a underground compound they plan to infiltrate; They can smell the diesel of an incoming military vehicle that hasn't even crossed a border control checkpoint; they can feel the heat of a fire that started hundred of hectacres downwind; They can see a termite crawl on the wooden window sill of a cabin on the opposite side of Lake Michigan.

Detect Physiological Responses: This ties in to a Sentinel's acute awareness to detail, in that they can focus their senses on an individual to determine whether they are lying or having a response to something. Examples: they can focus on the sound of a person's heartbeat to catch heartrate spikes as a sign of lying; They can smell the flopsweat on a person who is suddenly nervous; They will see any tics that betray a person's true intentions.

Accompanying enhanced strength/speed/reflexes: This isn't present in all depictions of Sentinels, but does occasionally come up as another way to make Sentinels seem more like superhuman protectors. In addition to their enhanced senses, they also react more quickly, which gives them the appearance of being faster and more agile. Or by shutting down senses that transfer pain, they can push their bodies beyond normal human limits.

Guide Ability Specifics

Grounding a Sentinel: A Guide's attributes are all meant to be a natural focal point for Sentinels, so Guides use their voice and touch to draw a Sentinel's attention onto them, or will have them focus on their smell or their heartbeat to settle and orient their own senses.

Dialing up/down a Sentinel's Senses: The 'Dials' concept is often used in this trope for visualizing how each set of senses can be scaled up or down with the assistance of a Guide. Guides will often instruct Sentinels to think of each sense as having an accompanying dial that goes from 0 to 10. If they dial a sense down to Zero, it can actually disable that sense for a Sentinel entirely, which is dangerous but sometimes necessary to protect a Sentinel from zoning. Equally, a Guide will rarely have a Sentinel dial any sense up to 10 without first considering the risks of overexposure and zoning out.

Empathic Sensitivity: some Guides are also written as empaths that can sense the feelings of those around them, not just their Sentinel. When this is the case, the empathic connection between Guide and Sentinel is often exponentially stronger than anything they can pick up from regular people around them. This often leads to the telepathic bond with the Sentinel as well.

Tap into a Sentinel's Active Senses: Some Guides can perceive things through the eyes/ears/nose of their Sentinel, an experience passed through the telepathic/psychic bond so that Sentinel and Guide can share information seamlessly. Again, your mileage may vary on this element of the trope.

Ok I'm going to end this lengthy post here, but this is my way of documenting beloved fanlore that has managed to survive nearly thirty years as a community driven idea. It's a creative concept spanning media platforms (from analog to online), fan-driven social circles for diverse storylines and topics, and the everchanging nature of time and memory on our collective consciousness. I hope this trope, like others before it, finds a way to live forever.

[singingcicadas]

A popular thing I can never get behind in the TF fandom is somehow Optimus is always The Dad Figure TM? None of the continuities I’ve read/watched has ever given me that vibe. Mentor figure, sure. Older brother. That weird cross between older brother and father. The dubbed version of G1 in my country literally has the Autobots calling him “big brother” so I guess that affects my impression. 

Like honestly the closest I can relate to Dad!Optimus is the Optimus in tfp and idw, and that’s more like, a patriarch. A father in the sense kings are fathers to their people. Bayverse OP also falls a little into this category. They care a lot for their Autobots, there’s love and friendship and devotion, but they’re also distanced by the weight of leadership. The duty of Prime (and all the baggage that comes with it), always comes first, before any personal connections. 

The rest: Cyberverse Optimus is def big brother. Tfa OP is a young guy in over his head and trying to herd cats. Wfc OP is vulnerable both physically and emotionally, stubborn but in constant need of reassurance; Bumblebee’s mental state is more stable than his.