Five years ago to the day, I worked on a Rancor painting for the Jabba' Realm expansion to Imperial Assault. Today, I am sharing with you the process and steps that went into making that painting. It is a little hard to believe that I made this painting five years ago, that it has sat in my blog queue folder all this time and all that I have done in these past five years. It feels like yesterday, and it feels like twenty years ago. To start things off, here is the final painting for the Rancor.
Rancor
Imperial Assault - Jabba's Realm Expansion
11 x 14 - Acrylic and pencil on board
Art Director - Deb Freytag
Original - SOLD
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games This was the second time I was asked to paint a Rancor for the Fantasy Flight Star Wars games. This time the Rancor needed to be depicted living its best life on its homeworld of Dathomir. That meant lots of red and lots of RAWRs. I have been more than acquainted with the Rancor since the summer of 1983, and it is a real treat to paint this particular Star Wars monster.
While I talk a lot about my process, always beginning reference, I am not able to share that reference. Much of it is pictures of me in my underwear, and no one needs to see that. When it comes to my work on Star Wars, I can employ my extensive collection of Star Wars toys to carry the bulk of the heavy lifting. It is not every project that you can open a box and have instant perfect reference for an assignment. While I have an idea for compositions and images in my head, when I use the toys as reference I can build little dioramas to better work things out, or I can position the figures into dozens of poses and arrangement as quickly as needed. Here is a look at some of the many photos that I used for reference for this painting.
Rancor Reference
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games
With the reference collected, I can begin on thumbnails. I look at all my options, see what which are speaking to me, determine which work best for the assignment, and decide which I would like to actually paint. Typically, there are three to four winners, and they move onto becoming thumbnails. While some of the references is used nearly as is, some will be combined with other elements, edited, or in some way changed to make it work better. You must be aware that the reference is not perfect. While something looks correct in the real world, once it becomes a drawing or painting, it can begin to look awkward or wrong. Here are the four thumbnails that I submitted for this assignment.
Rancor Thumbnails
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games
Option 'D' was selected, but I was asked to make some changes. For one, the planets/moons in the sky were too large and too dominant and they needed to be made smaller. The other issue was that the figure was crowding the chrome of the card that it was eventually going to be on. One of the problems with most of my work on the Star Wars properties was that I wanted all of my paintings to be up close and in the art's action. Most of the Star Wars games had many borders, numbers, information, and elements that cut into the art or overlapped it. This meant that there needed to be a lot of padding, especially at the top of the image, for the card's chrome to overlay. This meant that many of my thumbnails were updated to pull back from the subject matter and add a lot of padding around the figures. Here is my updated thumbnail, and you can see how much more room there is now around the Rancor.
Revised Rancor Thumbnail
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games
This updated thumbnail was approved without further With an approved thumbnail, it was time to work on the final drawing that would be the blueprint for my painting. As mentioned many many times before, this is my favorite part of the process, and it often feels like the part I have the least time for. I have done things differently in my process over the past year to change that a little. But that is for another day and another assignment.
Rancor
Imperial Assault - Jabba's Realm Expansion
17 x 14 - Pencil on paper
Art Director - Deb Freytag
Original - SOLD
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games The drawing was approved without comment, and that meant it was time to start my painting. By this point, I had produced several traditional paintings for Star Wars, and some of the fear had begun to ease when beginning one of these pieces. I was still somewhat worried that I would ruin it all, but I was experienced enough to know what to do if I did ruin it. Here is a look at the process of the Rancor painting coming together from thumbnail to final approved painting.
Rancor Process
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games
I got the painting to the point that I thought was done. It felt like it hit all the marks and with knowing how the painting would be used and printed, I figured I had all my bases covered. Here is the first version of the Rancor painting that I turned in.
Rancor Version 1
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games
I don't remember any comments about the Rancor itself, and I don't see any difference in the painting - though I likely touched it all again, production wanted more done to the foreground and background. They wanted more pop, more detail, and they wanted it all to have more more more. I did as they asked because I am a professional, and you meet the requests of the client. I went back to the painting and pushed and pulled the background more. I added a lot more to the foreground and middle ground. For the most part, I just touched everything in the painting one more time to give it all a little more attention. As mentioned, I am not sure I did much or anything to the Rancor, after all, it is the star of the piece and got a ton of love and attention already. Here again, is the final painting of the Rancor that I submitted and was approved.
Rancor
11 x 14 - Acrylic and pencil on board
Original - SOLD
© 2016 Lucasfilm, Ltd. TM Lucasfilm, Ltd. Under license to Fantasy Flight Games Now, let us have a look at the final production card that my art appears on. It is a good thing that all that additional work that I did on the card really got to shine in the card and really made a difference to how the art looked. Oh well. It is out of my hands, and I did what I was asked to do.
Rancor card in a handy dandy form
The art was reused in another of FFG's Star Wars games a year or so ago. You see a bit more of the art, but it was printed so very, very small on the card. The extra work goes pretty much unseen here as well.
Rancor reprinted as part of the Out Rim game, making it even smaller.
Do not get me wrong. I did as I was asked, without complaint or concern, and it did result in a visually more complex painting that could be considered better. I only wish that the extra work was visible to those playing the game. Oh well, it is all a little late now!
That's all for another exciting Wednesday on the blog. See you back here on Friday! Until then...
For more samples of my work or to contact me regarding my availability, head over to my website: www.christopherburdett.com
