The Anatomy of Elemental Evil
© 2013 Wizards of the Coast
As always... I started off everything with some good ole thumbnails. This entity was described as a massive column made of lava, steam and tentacles. Determining if this was a massive column made of tentacles or a massive column that has tentacles was a big element of this piece. For the thumbnails I was erring on the side of made of lava and has some lava tentacles. I was also beginning to realize that this piece was quickly becoming a landscape rather then a monster portrait...
The Anatomy of Elemental Evil - Thumbnails
© 2013 Wizards of the Coast
"C" was the winner and it was finally decided that this was in fact a massive column MADE of tentacles AND lava. I can get behind that. There was a request to give a piece a little more of a tilt and I could proceed forward with the final drawing. Speaking for drawings... here is how it turned out...
The Anatomy of Elemental Evil - Drawing
© 2013 Wizards of the Coast
The drawing was approved without any revisions and I was all set to paint some lava tentacles. When I was working on this piece I had recently finished a ton of Mephits, one of which was made of lava. This allowed me to hit the ground running with the painting since I had already worked out a color palette and texture scheme. With many materials it is more about hitting the correct pattern of light or warms and cools to get it to ready correctly. Lava is one of those materials. With the main material of this piece all set I was ready to make a painting in 10 easy steps...
The Anatomy of Elemental Evil - Process steps
© 2013 Wizards of the Coast
There is a lot going on with this piece and it was important that I was in control of it all. There needed to be steam, lava, water, floating rocks, brimstone falling from the sky, and that massive column of tentacles. One of my bad habits that I am always trying to be conscience of making sure that I don't repeat shapes and movement in things like tentacles. Are they all the same size? Are they all bending or curving in the same direction? Be mindful that you make them different and interesting! Repetition can be good... and it also can be very distracting and bad. Just go ask Greg Manchess. Again, here is how the final piece turned out...
The Anatomy of Elemental Evil
© 2013 Wizards of the Coast
That is all for another exciting week on the blog, see you back here on Monday! Until then...
For more samples of my work or to contact me regarding my availability head over to my website: www.christopherburdett.com
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