Malthus Cartoon Art Thread

[jimmy olsen]

Is that a chained soul?

I'm not sure what a "chained soul" is ...

In this scene, Star is confronted with the soul-less corpse of her best friend/boyfriend #1, held by her boyfriend #2, while her town burns around her (in this show, having your soul eaten causes your corpse to float like a balloon).

Is there some gender bending going on here? Corpse definitely does not look male.

[Malthus]

Is that a chained soul?

I'm not sure what a "chained soul" is ...

In this scene, Star is confronted with the soul-less corpse of her best friend/boyfriend #1, held by her boyfriend #2, while her town burns around her (in this show, having your soul eaten causes your corpse to float like a balloon).

Is there some gender bending going on here? Corpse definitely does not look male.

Yup. Sort of.

The Corpse is of a boy dressed in drag, wearing a long wig.

The plot reason is that the soul-eater hates this particular persona in that outfit, and he was using himself as bait.

[Malthus]

The Final Butterfly Battle (from the episode "Conquer")

[Malthus]

Queen Moon in the Realm of Magic (from the episode "Divide")

[Malthus]

Eclipsa Unleashed:



Progress pictures (in case anyone is interested):

[grumbler]

Queen Moon in the Realm of Magic (from the episode "Divide")

I like these distorted reflection ones best.  This one my be my favorite of the lot (though there have been a lot of them that have been "my favorite" the first time I saw them).

[Malthus]

Queen Moon in the Realm of Magic (from the episode "Divide")

I like these distorted reflection ones best.  This one my be my favorite of the lot (though there have been a lot of them that have been "my favorite" the first time I saw them).

That was the picture I took the biggest chance with so far - I had literally no idea whether it was even possible to make the pool look like water (with a slick of dark magic washing off the central figure) using only three colors, plus having a reflection. I did some preliminary sketches, which seemed to work okay, them went for it. 

Concentric highlights actually seem to work to give the illusion of three dimensions. I was pretty happy that it turned out - halfway through I was sure it would be a mess.

[Malthus]

By the way, the picture of Moon in the Realm of Magic won a fan art competition on Reddit ... I won a prize worth a grand total of ... $30.    Oh well, still it was neat to win.

I've accepted a challenge from some people on the site to illustrate the climactic scene from the finale. I'm working with a size of paper I've never used before - 24" by 18", larger than any I've previously used. This will take some time.

Any interest in seeing the work in progress?

[grumbler]

I'm always interested in seeing works in progress.  I have no artistic skill, so enjoy watching the work of those that do.  It's like magic to me, suddenly seeing the work for what it is going to be.

[Malthus]

Okay, here's the first part - planning out the picture.

I usually do a very rough sketch to begin with, simply to see in my head all the parts of the scene and their approximate relation to each other, the overall darks and lights, and what overlaps what.

This scene is supposed to be the climax of the finale. The girl in the foreground in the heroine, Star. She's just lost a fight against a gigantic monster, who slapped her out of the air and was about to kill her, when the monster's mother, Eclipsa, appeared and tried to reason with her. The attempt fails and Eclipsa decides to kill her daughter, the monster, with magic. The scene shows Eclipsa (floating in the air) casting the killing spell on her daughter, while Star picks herself up off the ground. She's about to turn around.

So there are several elements to juggle - Star, Eclipsa casting the spell, the monster affected by the spell, the setting (a partly ruined castle, open to the sky).

The first decision is how to convey the impression of a gigantic monster, while still having some detail on the human-sized characters. To do that, I'll try to force the perspective - have Star in the immediate foreground, actually placing her outside of the internal frame of the picture; then, using Eclipsa to give human scale to the monster, and accentuate that with some details of the castle in the middle ground.

The next problem is, given that I'm only using three colours, how can I differentiate the shadows of the castle from the sky in a way that looks good? I'll try to use stars to give the sky a different appearance.

The 'back of a napkin' sketch works out the basic details, and a gesture drawing of the characters.



This drawing is actually pretty small. I then transfer those elements into a rough sketch of the drawing on the 24" by 18" paper. I adjust the relative size and placement of the figures - Star doesn't need to be so large.



Next time -what I'm working on now: finalizing the drawing and inking it in at the same time.

This is a relatively ambitious scene for me, I have no idea whether it will work visually or not!

[BuddhaRhubarb]

like these in process images. groovy series.

[Malthus]

like these in process images. groovy series.

Thanks!

The next one should be up tomorrow.

[Malthus]

Here's the inked image, with the picture now detailed. Only the paint left to do:

[Malthus]

The final version:

[jimmy olsen]

Awesome!