Tuponian Park Character Design for Telus Spark
Ryan Fairweather
In 2018, I was hired by Telus Spark Science Centre, located in Calgary, AB, to design a set of characters for an outdoor installation outside the centre for visitors to see. The direction they gave me was "make it science-y".
Since I favour character design, I ended up creating a concept called Tuponian Park. I would use the outdoor space of the science centre as the park and it would tell the story of a crew of animal explorers visiting a new planet and exploring and discovering its wildlife and environment.
The character above is a PengiPod, member of the crew, a suited up penguin explorer!
Covid struck and the installation never came to fruition. The characters were used as part of a guided nature tour describing various environmental features like wetlands and habitats.
Here are some select characters from my Tuponian series...
Limbic Mountain - a sentient piece of landscape discovered by the Tuponian crew.
Beaver Builder - member of the Tuponian crew
Rocket - Member of the Tuponian crew
Prismbear - native wildlife discovered by the Tuponians
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Posted Jul 13, 2025
Designed characters for Telus Spark Science Centre's outdoor installation, later used in nature tours.
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Timeline
Jan 31, 2018 - Mar 13, 2019
