Making of the "Last Stand"

Last Stand (2018). Digital.

Well, I finally finished my fifth illustration of the year for which I'll be writing my first "Making of" post.

This piece is the last (or latest) of a series of medieval fantasy themed illustrations. The series came about as a result of me being inspired by a couple of stories. In the last few months I've been playing a series of games called Dark Souls, which takes place on a medieval fantasy world. The setting for the games is quite dark and ominous. In a sense it sort of reflects "Last Stand" only with less hope. Think of what medieval limbo would look like if you add dragons and monsters. In addition to those games, I recently watched Disney's "The Reluctant Dragon" which is an animated film about a friendly dragon that refuses to fight a knight. Actually, My first two pieces in this series of illustrations were heavily inspired by that film.

The goal of those two illustrations is to depict a creature that should be menacing and frightening as friendly, funny and cute. This while also illustrating the idea of the unlikely and lovable hero.

Ye Olde S'mores (2018). Digital.

Both illustrations were meant to be cartoony and light-hearted. The first image was to be moderately rendered. I was working on effects for ambient occlusion while also experimenting with reflective light with the fire.

The second illustration was made in the style that's a bit different from my usual. It was made in the spirit of modern animated series, particularly the new Mickey Mouse shorts and new Ducktales series. I used bright, saturated colors, brushes that have a traditional look to them (especially brushes having a watercolor look), and line work made of vector paths.

Meet and Greet (2018). Digital.

Now on to the "Last Stand." The last stand started as a simple sketch. 

Initial sketch of "Last Stand". Like the first two illustrations, it also features a cartoony look.

Originally, the plan was to keep the series cartoony and lighthearted. It was going to have a bright blue, sunny sky, lush, bright green trees. The style was going to be similar to the second illustration with the bright colors and smooth line work However, the more I looked at the sketch, the more clear it was that the piece would do better if it was more realistic and thematically dark and grim. It had the silhouette of a menacing dragon, with sharp, straight features. That automatically removes the dragon out of the category of "Gentle Giant". The fact that it was a silhouette would be adding to the mystery of the creature's nature and its character's darkness, thus making it an eerie villain. Another thing of which to take note is the dragon's perceived forward pose, making him a more aggressive figure. The serious pose of the knight meant he is clearly seriously fighting this creature and perceives it as a definite threat.  The castle behind the knight was meant to give importance to the knight. The only things between the castle and the fate of the people living in it are the knight's bravery and fighting effort. 

So then the look of the knight changed to this:

Initial knight sketch.

This sketch was done after studying various images of knights in fighting poses. Notice the knight looked quite skinny compared to the final stage of the knight:

Knight detail.

This was not a mistake. I had a bit of trouble deciding what the knight would ultimately look like. I was hesitant about the final look of the knight's armor and shield. Would the armor be on top of the tunic? Would it be under? Would parts of the armor be on top and parts under the tunic? What would the helmet look like? 

The solution was to construct the knight "from the ground up." I knew it meant that, as an artist, I would be spending time painting things that will ultimately not be seen, but it helped me to better visualize the final look. So what does it mean to go from the ground up? I painted the knight layer by layer. Literally. I painted the knight's tights, then the full armor, then the tunic on top, the belts, the helmet, and the shield. Considering the thickness of the armor and clothing, the result made the knight looking thicker than on the sketch.

For the coat of arms, I chose to use the Franco family coat of arms, since it is my last name. I made a quick google search and went with the most convincing one. I applied it to the shield and the knight's tunic.

Shield detail.

Now, I wanted to give a very painterly feeling to the piece but I also wanted to detail certain things like the scratches on the shield or even imply the knight's chain-mail.

Mail armor detail

Anyways, I focused on using a brush that has a traditional texture to it. Not only that, but I wanted to really emphasize lost edges.

Edges detail.

This is the castle in full view:

Castle detail.

Being able to see the brushwork of different colors working together and how edges can "bleed" into each other resulted in being able to take any portion of the painting and still getting a somewhat beautiful abstract piece, as seen on the detail above. To see this, let's look at a couple of details that are extracted from the piece:

Clouds detail.

Trees detail.

To achieve this, I worked mostly with colors that are close to each other in hue, value, and saturation. The clusters of trees were made with simple brushstrokes that are so textured that they look like trees when zoomed out.

Let's turn our attention to the sunset. For the whole scene, I decided to increase its dramatization by using lots of reds. If you squint your eyes, you'll notice that the scene almost looks like it's on fire. This was intentional in order to make it more emotionally intense.

Sunset detail.

Specifically, look at the section under the sun. The far mountains and hills are turned red by the atmosphere but are also painted to look fiery. It's almost like flames are engulfing the piece. This painting is not meant to make you feel comfortable or at ease. It is an action story. It may end well or it may not. 

Even the cliff on which the knight is standing is red. It's not a pleasant red, however. It's the kind of red you think of when you think of cliffs on a fiery desert or volcano. The cliff was going to have to provide a solid stage for the knight so it was important to texturize it, but not so much as to take away attention from the rest of the scene.

Ground detail.

To do this texture was actually fairly easy. I used brushstrokes of analogous colors. Where I saw slightly darker colors, I decided to make small depressions there by applying slight shadows with a soft brush. Then I took a smaller brush with raised scatter settings and just going over the brushstroke boundary as I saw fit. I put a shadow for the edges facing away from the sun and highlights for the edges facing the sun. This gives the 

Let's look at the last significant element in the painting: the monster. Now, the original sketch depicted the back of a menacing dragon. However, looking at the piece as a whole, I found that ultimately adding a dragon would be too obtrusive. It would take away from the knight and the overall scene's composition because it would be too overbearing. So I made the last minute decision to change this aspect. I was debating on whether to have a monster at all and just have it be implied by the knight's fighting gesture. In the end, I decided that I would need a monster as menacing as a dragon whose presence is not as prominent. I started experimenting making silhouettes with my brush and eventually it started resembling a creature that many can associate fear with: a giant arachnid. 

Monster detail.

I made some pointy claws and fangs that didn't really get in the way of the scene but contributed to the theme of intense doom. Lastly, I decided to blur it to help give the image focus and avoid having to detail something that may take away from the entire composition. Blurring the image also allowed me to make very loose brushstrokes to create the monster since the blur would hide any brushstrokes lacking in quality.