DESERT WARRIORS - MAKING OF

Last August, I participated in an other Art Challenge, this time for Firestarter Community. Bjorn Hurri, a concept artist I respect a lot, was the judge. The theme was “Desert warriors” and I gave it the usual though process; “what if”… and started to sketch thumbnails.

Made as much studies/explorations as possible. After a couple of days, a picture formed in my mind, as well as a story - One thing I would very much like to master is the ability to make the perfect visual representation of the picture that forms in my mind, when I take that mental snapshot.

THE SCENE IN MY MIND

A poster-ish keyframe (wait WHAT ?) of a Martian Female Warrior standing before the arrival of an outsiders military convoy, in a desertic enviro. I though of an imminent combat situation, like an ambush of some sort. An ambiguous menacing key moment ? "One against an army" kind of situation ? Well, at least that was the main thought.

Now the other challenge was to convert that strange mind snapshot into an illustrated visual 

MAKING THE SCENE - THE PLAN

In addition to allow me to do the characteristic skills exercising, this also gave me the opportunity to have a closer look at 80’s Sci-fi movie posters, for inspiration, and think of it as a "pre-action" keyframe, but I didn't want to end up being too influenced by anything I watched. 

I started to deconstruct the mind snapshot as a storytelling tagline. The ruler sending his soldiers to take positions all over the planet  and this alien female warrior, ready to fight for her planet, stands in their way.

COMPOSITION, TALK TO ME

I drew and painted each part individualised, in case I changed my mind at some point. I also  make a list of keywords, to think about, while building the scene: movement, flow, framing, lighting and mood.

Needed to build this pre-fight scene with a subliminal notion that everything stops at her spear. But then, there are the setbacks of local opponent cross fight thing, thus the character in the far right.

To convey an heroic mood, I plotted a backlight (to my humble somewhat self taught and, never the less, avid googling of things to learn “limited understanding on subject of lighting”), also to convey a bit of a menacing mood to the narrative… I think I lost you by now...

But that woman is ready to fight even if enemies attack from the viewer side, by the looks of that double laser gun in her left hand. All that cold menacing weight comes from the background to meet the foreground character.


OLD HABITS FROM ANOTHER MOTHER

When I’m painting, I have the tendency to compartmentalise a lot, dividing the scene into specific tranches, layer upon layer, a little bit like a scenographic piece (as I’m still influenced by my mural art workflow when planning wall sized paintings). 

Descriptive structure of the painting, essential parts:

1- the landscape (common background for general scene)

2- vehicle geometries and hard surfaces first

3- warriors costume and weapons (conceptualised as I went, an impro!!)

4- the alien female warrior defiant posture

5- the other fighter

Note: There's the risk of loosing lighting harmony for the entire piece. Constant reminder I added to the production list.

FINAL PIECE

CONCLUSION - IS IT ?

I got a place in the runner ups, but that’s not what made me glow, no.
Best part was to get feedback from Master Hurri. Something in the composition decisions wasn’t quite right. Anatomy also wasn’t that much in place. I appreciate.

So I left the piece get out of my system for a while and then, came back for revisions.

You see, the first tank was positioned funny maybe, like it was parked or moving in the wrong direction. After some thought, I made the vehicle take most of the space to be more threatening (perspective needs to be reviewed?). The invader’s ruler should be in a place of dominion framed by tornados and…

If you ‘d like to contribute with a comment, share an opinion, some constructive feedback, please, feel free to do so.