Die Selemer Fänge

private fantasy illustration - 'Die Selemer Fänge'

This first step is preceded by research, sketching, and smaller studies, but this is essentially the final result.

In order to create mor of a graphical character piece without background, I chose some corny treasure map background to set the mood for this piece.

Once I have the silhouette as a selectable layer, I create an alpha channel to be able to work within its boundaries. In this case it also helps to differentiate the figure-ground-relation.

This is the most time consuming step. In order to create believable shadows and highlights and thus creating a sculpted form it is crusial to clearly define direction, kind, number and intensity of the lightsource(s).

The idea is to create an additional ambient occlusion layer on top of the sculpted forms and ideally to improve the readability of the forms.

This is the most important part of the actual costume design. The color palette gives also hints to cultural background of the characters as well as their mood.

The main thing is done, this is just detailing and texturing fun.

done.