The DOODLES, DESIGNS, and aRT of CHRISTOPHER BURDETT: mephit

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Friday, April 26, 2013

Mist, Steam, and Water Mephits - Prcoess

Back in March I shared with you the nine Mephits that I designed and illustrated for Dragon magazine issue #421. Since there are nine of them I am going to slit them up and share the process that went into making them through out this week. Today I have for you the last three Mephits, the Mist, Steam, and Water Mephits. As a reminder, here is how the final illustrations turned out...

Mist, Steam, and Water Mephits

As before, we start things out with some good ole thumbnails to see where the monsters take me. I worked on all of these in the order I have been posting them... basically alphabetically. By the time I got to these last Mephits I was beginning to suffer a little Mephit madness. They were all beginning to blend together and I was worried that they were beginning to be in the same poses and were not unique enough from each other. In the end I think I had just been staring at them all too long. Here is how the thumbnails turned out for the last three Mephits...

Mist Mephit - Thumbnails

Steam Mephit - Thumbnails

Water Mephit - Thumbnails

The thumbnail that got away was option "B" of the Steam Mephit. I know it is not very different from "A", but it had a flow and movement I really liked. In the end the winners wereMist "B", Steam "A", and Water "B". With that all settled I moved onto the final drawings...

Mist Mephit - Drawing

Steam Mephit - Drawing

Water Mephit - Drawing

As with the rest of the drawings these were all approved without issues and I moved onto the final illustrations. This week the Mist Mephit won this week's process progression place...

Mist Mephit - Process progression

The finals were all approved save for a couple little tweaks. Two of the tweaks were that the Mist and Steam Mephits were too dark. As you can see above the last step shows how much I lightened the piece to meet approval. The original Steam Mephit was about a dark as the final Mist was and to be lighten a lot as well. This was easy enough to handle since I was working digitally... I shudder to think if I was working traditionally...

That's 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

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Fire, Ice, and Magma Mephits - Prcoess

Back in March I shared with you the nine Mephits that I designed and illustrated for Dragon magazine issue #421. Since there are nine of them I am going to slit them up and share the process that went into making them through out this week. Today I have for you the second set of three of Mephits, the Fire, Ice, and Magma Mephits. As a reminder, here is how the final illustrations turned out...

Fire, Ice, and Magma Mephits

These three Mephits are running hot and cold... But seriously, these Mephits were a great exercise in creating different materials and effects. I have a ton of great magma and lava reference now. That stuff is really fun to paint. As before, I got started on some thumbnails to get things rolling...

Fire Mephit - Thumbnails

Ice Mephit - Thumbnails

Magma Mephit - Thumbnails

I will say I had high hopes for Fire option "C". There was just something about it that I really liked... something about the feet just being fire and the body reforming from the tops of the 'ankle' flames. Also, who doesn't just love a tongue made out of fire? The idea of Magma option "C" seemed like a really cool design before I began working it out on paper. I imagined a lower torso made out of rock with a bowl like waist. The lava upper body would be coming out of the container that the lower body like a fountain of magma... but I am not sure I really hit the mark with this thumbnail. I should have spent some more time working it out... but by the time I was finished with it I was liking "B" a lot more.

When it was all said and done, Fire "B", Ice "A", and Magma "B" were the winners. I moved onto creating the final drawings...

Fire Mephit - Drawing

IceMephit - Drawing

Magma Mephit - Drawing

The drawings were all approved and I was given the go ahead to work on the final illustrations. As before, I am posting one of the three as a process progression. I was really happy with how the Magma Mephit turned out so here it is from start to finish...

Magma Mephit - Process progression

Again, in just eight easy steps... not really. This one took a little longer then the rest do to all the smaller forms and textures in the whole. I was worried that in the end it would become a jumbled mess and not read well. Hopefully I succeeded in not making it a mess...

That is all for another exciting Wednesday, see you back here on Friday for the last three Mephits! Until then...

For more samples of my work or to contact me regarding my availability head over to my website: www.christopherburdett.com

Monday, April 22, 2013

Air, Dust, and Earth Mephits - Prcoess

Back in March I shared with you the nine Mephits that I designed and illustrated for Dragon magazine issue #421. Since there are nine of them I am going to slit them up and share the process that went into making them through out this week. Today I have for you Air, Dust, and Earth Mephits. As a reminder, here is how the final illustrations turned out...

Air, Dust, and Earth Mephits

I was given very simple open ended descriptions for all of these which allowed me a lot of room explore my take on the Mephits. I tried to give a range of cautious to a little wacky on all of these to see what the art department was looking for.

Before I began to work on any of the Mephits I did a photo shot with both myself and my wife in front of the camera. I wanted to work out some poses that I planned to use and to see what else happened while I moved around in an open space thinking about each of the different kinds of Mephits. I recommend doing this! Not only does it produce the unexpected, it helps you get physically into your subject matter and generates a bunch of reference that you can use for the assignment and hopefully on other projects.

Once the photos were taken and sorted I got to work on thumbnails for all of the Mephits...

Air Mephit - Thumbnails

Dust Mephit - Thumbnails

Earth Mephit - Thumbnails

"A" was always a 'safe' concept and by "C" I was trying to push things to see what works and does not work. For each of these "A" was the winner. I would have really liked to work on "C" of the Air Mephit... but that is how it goes. Once I had approved thumbnails I moved forward on the final drawings.

Air Mephit - Drawing

Dust Mephit - Drawing

Earth Mephit - Drawing

There were a LOT of transparent and translucent Mephits. I think this is the most transparent and translucent monsters that I have even created and they were all in once assignment. Most of my monsters tend to me a little more... solid. All of the drawings were approved and I moved onto the finals. Since there are so many Mephits I chose one of each set of three to share the process progression. The winner from this set is the Earth Mephit...

Earth Mephit - Process preogression

In just eight easy steps you to can have your very own Earth Mephit... or not. Of the three, this one took the most time to complete. The Dust Mephit seemed to be done before I even began it. There were some very different completion times for these illustrations. Which is to be expected with this many different materials and capacities.

That is all for another exciting Monday, see you back here on Wednesday for another three Mephits! Until then...

For more samples of my work or to contact me regarding my availability head over to my website: www.christopherburdett.com

Monday, March 18, 2013

Creature Incarnations: Mephits

The March issue of Dragon magazine is out and I am happy to share with you my contributions to this issue. Dragon #421 features the article, Creature Incarnations: Mephits, and as you may have guessed, it is just FULL of Mephits! I was asked to update and illustrate a veritable army of Mephits, and this is how they turned out...

Air Mephit

Dust Mephit

Earth Mephit

Fire Mephit

Ice Mephit

Magma Mephit

Mist Mephit

Steam Mephit

Water Mephit

I may sound like a broken record, but I sure love being assigned projects that let me design something new or update existing D&D monsters. Not that there is anything wrong with the established designs, I just really enjoy adding my voice to the mighty fantasy empire that is D&D. I tried to be true to the various established looks and feels of the Mephits as well as bring some of my own design sensibilities into it. I am not sure if I have ever painted as many translucent and transparent monsters as this assignment required! As always, I would like to thank Kate Irwin for involving me on this project and for her art direction!

In the coming weeks I will have for you my concepts, sketches, and a few process step by step breakdowns for these pieces.

That is all for another exciting Monday on the blog, see you back here on Wednesday! Until then...

For more samples of my work or to contact me regarding my availability head over to my website: www.christopherburdett.com