A bit of Jean Giraud, a bit of Takayuki Takeya. I think the starting point was a photo of the skull of a pug, which I thought was pretty sinister and strangely cuddly all at once. A little bit fishy: there's a little bit of the Akbar about it also... For the paint job on the head (this is getting incredibly specific now) I used photos of the first "bambi burster" maquette, painted by the legendary Gino Acevedo in his early career.