Into the Heart of the Machine

Here is the second piece for the contest going on over at Palladium, a role-playing-game publisher.

With this piece I decided to try out a lighting trick I had seen many times before and read about recently. The idea is to use a series of different colored lighting, creating zones of color, to enhance the sense of distance in the painting.

For this image, I wanted to generate a feeling of caution and unease. I tried to do that with color, composition, and narrative. I tried to choose colors that clash a bit, and as you get deeper into the city, where the characters are, the color and angle of the light becomes more and more artificial. I tilted the composition to give the viewer a sense of disorientation, a trick I stole from film noir cinematography. I tried to design the structures in the background so that their function isn't completely clear, making them more alien, then added the human element of graffiti on the foreground wall. The back two characters are stooped over and aware, but the foremost one is calm. My hope is that these disorienting contradictions establish a mood of simultaneous fear and exhilaration, anxiety and curiosity, that comes with embarking on an epic adventure, because the adventure is what RPGs are all about.

Here is the finished piece from last week (duh). I decided to switch from cool blue colors to oranges and reds to convey the sense of urgency and violence.


Here is the second piece I'm making for the contest. I'm still deciding on a color palette, but I don't think the tones need much more work.


Also, after a lot of cleaning, tossing, rearranging, and more cleaning, I finally finished setting up a studio in my garage with Jessica.

WIP from a Week Well Spent

All this past week I've been trying to dig in and put as many hours as I can towards this piece and one other for a contest being held by an RPG publisher. I've been trying to focus on mood and composition lately, reading as much as I can and looking at a lot of the illustrators from the golden age.

The Monstrous Manual Project 001

I recently dug out my old Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual. Flipping through it reminded me of how much I used to sit with it in front of me, just looking at the illustrations. It's part of the reason I got into art. Anyway, it occurred to me that with all the great creature descriptions inside, I should try making my own illustrations. If nothing else, it'll be good practice and more stuff for the portfolio.

DISCLAIMER:

Dear Wizards of the Coast,

Please don't sue me.

Thanks,
~Z~


Aarakocra

The first creature in the Monstrous Manual, as it is alphabetized by the creature names, is the Aarakocra. Aarakocra are bird men that live in tribes in the mountains. They share large communal nests, and hunt with javelins using their thumbs on both hands and feet.

Sketchbook Update