ART WAR 4 | 2D | War of the Elements | The Golemwalker | motocrabproductions

Golemwalker is a pilot for a massive human skeleton that is a lightening conduit at will. Although the lightening can be wielded as a weapon, the energy is too sporadic and imprecise to be used unless as a last resort. The golem is primarily a defensive character and can use the gathered lightening to teleport itself and any living creature within a 350 foot radius. I'm thinking primarily about scale, shape, and lighting in addition to a 'grounded' fantasy for this illustration.

Name: Shawn Watkins
Email: motocrabproductions@gmail.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MotocrabProd
Artstation: https://www.artstation.com/motocrab

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Ok, I'm a good ways into my painting already for the competition but this is my first time getting into the forums. I have some concept, wip, and thought process' to post first. So moodboard is a thing? neat. I slapped a bunch of things together here.

Initially, my idea involved a pretty flat image with a horizon and massive skeleton in the background. There is this Japanese folklore creature called Gashadokuro. So, this giant skeleton is made up of the bones from people who died of starvation. This was an initial inspiration and something I've had in my mind for a while.

Usually, I start thinking about composition first. For this project, I'm putting value on large shapes, sense of scale, readability. The story imo should be simple here. I'm thinking about what I get out of looking through works from Jakub Różalski and Simon Stålenhag. The idea of a normal looking environment with a story or character that is out-of-place, thus suggesting alternate histories or oddly realistic fantasies, is a conceptual archetype for me.

I don't really do thumbnails or anything like that but I start off thinking about composition and colors while randomizing my sketches. I was going to do a fisheye perspective so I could fill as much of the space as possible with the characters but I felt like a simpler way to show scale was better.

The rural environment is a bunch of big squares intersected with roads in moonlight. The skeleton golem has a lot of big circular shapes I can cast some light around to solidify this massive structure and make it pop out from the farmland. Lastly for composition, you might notice a triangle that is formed going from the eyesocket to the hand then to the feet where all the cars are. The triangle is where I want viewers eyes to wander so my I'm positioning light in the scene to enhance this concept.

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Values and gradient maps. I'm thinking about rotating the whole thing 90 deg clockwise. The tringle shape in the middle would more of a Frank Frazetta 'power' triangle with the top being lightening sparks in the skelly hand. Ya? I'd love some feedback, especially about the whole idea of out-of-place characters/objects in normal environments.

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So, the square shapes I want pretty sequential and desaturated in color. There should be some contrast in the cop and truck scene by the foot I'm thinking. These large shapes help to separate the composition to make it readable and give more focus to the scale. One thing I'm not really happy about is the character controlling the skeleton. The scale of that char is already off I think. I'm trying to find a balance of visibility for that character and space for the skeleton to take up.

I decided to write out a backstory narrative for the Golemwalker character. I don't think it'll be super long or anything. Here's the first part and I'll probably finish it up with a second part tomorrow.

Backstory: Unmovable at a downtown intersection, rigid against the Marriott high-rise, is a still and seated human skeleton. From the bottom of it's pelvis to the top of it's skull, booming well above the 16th floor of it's seat, is scaffolding and abandoned equipment. Contrasted with the rusted railing and dilapidated drapes were blinking sensors and cameras throughout the body while a heavy looking sphere hung midway down the skeletons' chest.

"How big is it maaam?"

Billy's eyes beam past her nose and down to a snot-nosed-asshole-to-be, as all children were, crowding in front of blinking crosswalk lights with its mother. Traffic shifted as the crowd crossed and the kid, only slightly annoyed at it's mothers' neglect, wiped the glazed booger beard off his face and clasped his moms' hand before hopping up the streetcurb. A rare half chuckle from Billy before making her way to the top of the Marriott hotel.

A few years ago, the skeleton appeared in downtown Austin surrounded by coiled static and powdery fog that effected a four and a half block circumference. After the initial snap of lightening and the rolling grumble that followed, the skeleton sat, leaned against the hotel, head tilted up and into the sky, inert. Back then, a short distance down the same block, Billy and her family were munching on an assortment from Ken's doughnuts and now she stood in a museum, atop a hotel, dedicated to this phenomenon. Centered in the museum are plaques with the names of people who disappeared in the area surrounding the skeleton at the moment of it's arrival. Above the plaques are maps of differing orientation with lists of the estimated amounts of vanished animals and insects. Billy traced the plaque of engraved names until she came to her father, mother and big brother. She remembered setting opposite her family on a patio outside Kens when the sound fractured around her. Doughnuts fell to the pavement in place of her family and the air froze in front of her.

Backstory cont: Arrows taped on the museum floor marked the intended flow of traffic and led Billy to a new balcony where opened locks lined plexiglass windows. She found herself in line to touch the skeleton; a backside bone rib that almost filled the balcony opening. Billy started to leave as a docent presented a clipboard to the woman standing behind her. (Oh...huh. It's that kid.) A slight pleasure kept Billy in line so as not to give up her spot to that dumb looking kid.

"It's just a thing...if you or anyone you know were near the area back then..." recites the docent, looking from the woman to the kid and back.

The mother waves him away with squinted eyes. On the clipboard, a federal government logo depicting the regulatory body that deals with all giant skeleton matters flashed toward Billy; the same logo that appears every month on her government checks, her bi-annual medical and psychological tests, as well as government surveillance waivers. Now in front of the rib, a permissive draft bloomed into the balcony opening.

"Maam, I want a turn already," the dumb kid spits past his crusty mouth while his maam gestures Billy toward the rib.

The crackled, porous material blended into smooth bone under Billy's hand but in place of rib was skull. Her hand between two caverns that extended beyond her vision. A kaleidoscope of cosmic scale; galactic nurseries, collapsing stars, sandy shoals from unknown places now projected from where the skeletons' eyes would be and through Billy's mind. At once, but still outside of time, everything in the expanding universe was known and seen by her and then was gone. Primordial elements and swirling symbols in constant conflict receded. Visions of her family cast across spacetime began to fade.

Encased in shadow, Billy pulled up her phone light to see a concave wall on one side and an opening on the other. She stepped up to the moonlit bone and, looking first down the skull and then the length of the standing skeleton, studied farmland, far away from the city. From the eye socket, she lifted her hand to the glistening cosmos as the skeleton mimicked the motion. Lightening darted around the bony hand and Billy became familiar with the nature of the skeleton; pulling her into a war of elements while she struggled to remember the visions of her lost family. While the air stalled, a visceral stretching anchored Billie and aimed her in a direction; a map. They were gone.

Some more sketching today. Thinking about Billy's look and other pose ideas. I'm almost happy with the painting I've done on the main composition.

This could be almost finished. I colored in some masks to paint in the skeleton from my lineart and it always makes things look overly digital.

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So I've been thinking about painting a carved lightening symbol in the skull. A lame place to put it? I dunno. Also, I'm still not sure how I'm gonna crop it. With/ without black bars?

Thanks! Ya, I see how the vertical version complicates the shapes too much. I get bogged down thinking too much about perspective. After the first lineart, I thought about going back to do some fisheye stuff lol.

I'm all about giving it a go. Still have a week or so I think. Thanks for giving my posts a look through. I'm wowed by the creativity I'm seeing on everyones' posts.

Ooo, didn't think about this. A big light would look cool coming from inside the ribcage. Bright rim lighting around the ribs. Maybe more lightening there like an engine gathering fuel or something. Did a quick values pass.

Thanks! I put something together today. I'm working on some more subtle gradients now to adjust colors. Might desaturate just the background for the finished one. Also, I'm feeling like the lightening engine in the chest is too much? Hmm.

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I did play around with the idea a lot in painting but still couldn't get it right in composition. As far as the character mechanics go, the chest light from an engine is really awesome. You can submit two pics for final entry. I wonder if that's for character sheets or maybe mechanics that turn on/off or the like?