I was tasked with bringing an Ornament Golem to life for Critical Crafting. Considering a creature that's made up entirely of a random assortment of small shapes, it was a tough challenge creating not only a design that wasn't confusing, but also an appealing image to look at.
Final Illustration
The task also involved these two goblins being tied up, that were meant to somewhat resemble the invaders from the Home Alone movie, which was a nice touch.
In hindsight, having a window above a fireplace doesn't make a lot of sense, but for the purposes of this illustration, it helped, so we can pretend.
Composition Thumbnails
Design Exploration
During the ideation process, I explored the idea of tree roots taking hold of the ornaments, making the tree the source or center of the Golem. But it was ultimately decided that for it to be an Ornament Golem, the focus should be on them, and that they should comprise it's primary shape.
Design arrived at after feedback
Within the ratio constraints and the pre-established "camera" position, I had figured from the start, that in order to make the shape less confusing, I would set a fireplace as a backlight - the main light source. And a "window" right above, casting a contrasting winter blue light.
I was tasked with bringing the folklore creature 'The Hidebehind' to life. The mission was to keep it organic but still with an appearance that could blend in with branches/trees.
The idea was that he'd have these tumor-like growths that would look like branches, to better camouflage itself at night in the forest.
This one was a custom request that required the character to have someone's likeness. The assignment was a "swarm master vampire", with swarms of bats, rats, insects, spiders, etc. - Regal/refined feel, but with and animalistic feel.
Most of the notes I got in terms of the final comp were to keep adding more critters, and to change his expression to a toothy smirk instead of shouting.
This style of design is really outside of my wheelhouse, so I tried to keep it simple while adhering to the client's preferences.
For the composition, I had to figure out a way to show the dragon's scale, while also giving it a good pose that fit within the ratio restrictions, as well as making sure the background read as a Japanese koi pond.
The design went through many iterations, some leaning more fish-like, with dragon features, and other more dragon-like. The final choice was to go in the Dragon with Koi fish features direction.
The task for this one, was to create a design for a fire wielding mage, that's welded shut inside their own armor. A general moodboard was provided to me.
Final Illustration
Ultimately the director hand picked a couple of select bits from different versions, which led to the design in the final illustration.
Some quick exploration for their design. Some leaning more on classic medieval armor aspects, other more fantasy, and some more "mechanized".
Some quick exploration for their "action pose" for the final illustration.