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So besides trying to keep up with a few Magic cards, I’ve been doing a lot of Star Wars packaging designs. But it’s still top secret, so I can’t give you a cozy little link or anything.
I’ve also had fun with several magical horses and unicorns for Bella Sara. But back to Lorwyn since that’s the title of this post. By far, the most popular of the 5 illustrations I did for Lorwyn was Secluded Glen.
When I got this assignment I
thought, "Hey, cool, mostly a landscape all magical and pretty," and it reminded me of a photo I took of myself at our cabin several years ago.
I really love the streaming light. I brought the feel of our cabin into the
painting. I imagined myself there in Secluded Glen… the magical domain of the Queen
Fairy. Its first name was "Fairy Glen." It was supposed to be
over-the-top colorful, green, storybook. I first had to figure out how
it would look in real life and then push it to be more magical,
colorful and enchanting…that was the challenge. Apparently it was a
good card for some reason. The day before the pre-release I got
several emails asking about the sketch and original.
And then there are the 2 that Philip Tan and I did together: Deeptread Merrow and Timber Protector. I know Philip through Kirk Dilbeck,
a mutual friend and art collector. He’s done amazing pencils for Spawn, etc., (go check him out) so he sketched and I painted…it worked really well. Philip is a detail maniac. We worked together on the composition of the tree guy (which had 3 different
incarnations), but the other one I only painted.
TITLE: [Inkfathom Deeptread]*
SIZE: 2 1/16" wide x 1 1/2" tall
ART DESCRIPTION:
Color: Blue Creature
Location: undergound river or aquifer
Action:
A deep-swimming merfolk holds a waterproof ‘lantern’ that consists of a
sealed glass container full of fireflies. This illuminates her way
through the murky depths where almost no merfolk venture
Focus: the merfolk
Mood: merfolk aren’t really capable of fear, so she should seem curious and alert
Notes: Merfolk concepts are on pp. 32 – 37 of the styleguide.
I did a cool sketch for Timber Protector, but Jeremy didn’t like it.
Timber Protector:
TITLE: [Noble Taoiseach]*
SIZE: 2 1/16" wide x 1 1/2" tall
ART DESCRIPTION:
Color: Green creature
Location: forest
Action:
Show an ash-treefolk leader. He wields a staff that looks made of
carved bone. He stands proudly, and behind him can be seen the
silhouettes of other treefolk — the ones he leads.
Focus: the ash treefolk leader Mood: Proud, wise
The other 2 cards I did were Faerie Trickery and Moonglove Extract:
A salamand shaman fires a burst of flame from his/her hands, but at the
end of the burst, the flames burn in multiple vivid colors and
transform into colorful flower petals that float away on the breeze.
The salamand should look outraged.
Focus: the spell being neutralized
Mood: foiled
Notes: Faeries on styleguide pp. 38 – 41.
Show a small glass or crystal vial that contains an opaque liquid of
the palest blue, almost white. The vial sits on a bed of greenery, but
the greenery has shriveled and turned black in the area around the vial
itself. This vial contains magically deadly poison.
Focus: the vial
Mood: beautiful and capable of causing instant death
So, that’s a little bit of the skinny on my Lorwyn art. I wonder how this will look when I hit "publish." This blogging thing is still a bit new.
