Peril
This was an exploration of trying to capture a moment in what I love about the Fantasy genre. I wanted to push myself to do something moody, magical, and mysterious. As with all my illustrations, they begin and end in photoshop.
It started with a character I had done in my sketchbook about a year or so ago. Then as I was just playing around with thumb-nailing various shapes, this scene began to emerge. I went back to my sketchbook to see if I could resurrect some old ideas, and I pulled from that older sketch. Initially, I was inspired by a lot of photography I had been seeing at the time where they use wonderful, hard lighting and push the majority of the model into shadow, and I wanted to utilize some of that. As the piece evolved, I started seeing it with these misty-blues that reminded me of those fantasy movies I grew up with, like Willow and Star Wars. As I developed the wardrobe, I wanted to bring in my love for ancient dress and to visualize this with non-conventional clothing, even non-conventional for most of the fantasy genre. I love me some of that.
I strictly used photoshop. I am mostly a digital artist when it comes to illustration. I will sometimes use photo refs of myself or my wife, or build some objects in a 3D program to work out some fussy technical details.
I think people respond well to it, but my work requires a bit of imagination. It's less poetic, and more narrative focused. It's not the kind of thing most people want to hang above their fireplace. I was selling my work at an art show recently when an older lady walked by with raised eyebrows, and in a superior tone "oh, this work needs... a special place". I thanked her and laughed when she left. But honestly, I love world building, costume design, production design, and bringing something that only exists in the mind to life.
Thank you for reading. I do a wide range of work, from Production Design, Sculpture, Illustration, and others. Check out more on my website or insta @tDub248