Fantasy characters, sketches and drawings.
Finally my first non-Christmas themed comic page (apart from my Mr. Scarecrow one which I drew at art college).
I approached this as a professional comic book artist would, from (my own)script, thumbnails, drawing and inking the panels and so on. An excellent exercise; it really made me appreciate the skill of my favourite comic-book writers, letterers, colourists and artists.
The next one will be at least two pages long!
Fonts by Blambot
A brief diversion back to my demon concepts. Here is my idea for the warlock demons; I hope the notes fairly are self-explanatory but here is a bit more description:
Demons warped through their use of dark magic are usually stunted and need creatures (slaves or other beasts) to convey them to the front line. Here I’ve designed a dog-demon for the weirdest-looking warlock to ride (controlled by a control rune linked to his master) based in part on cryptozoology’s ‘Texas Blue Dogs’.
http://www.forteantimes.com/features/fbi/6298/texas_blue_dogs.html
Next, for my ghostly-gas polluting demon I doodled some ideas for the way he could travel around (a balloon or carried by a flying demon) but the bloated soldier demon seemed to suit him (it?).
And finally for the arch-warlock, the most powerful wizard in the demon army (apart from of the Demon Lords ) he required a more high-tech magical way of moving around and fighting so I invented this automaton-cage device.
Here’s my update from my 2007 sketchbook of the mutant pirates I designed. I thought they seemed to be adapted for fighting in the air (extra hands and suchlike).
Just to prove I’ve not been idle recently here is a section of the first panel of my (third) comic strip. These are centaur demons on the battle lines.
Here’s my idea for the Demon cavalry; rather than having demonic knights(I may design some later, reading that does sound cool!) I thought they should use centaur-like Demons.
I had to keep the image away from Games Workshop Dragon-Ogres and Zoats, and Blizzard’s Pit Lords or Diablo 3’s Siegebreaker Assault Beasts. So I had a look at the Terror Dogs from Ghostbusters, crossed them with alligators/crocodiles and with an image in my head of a huge monstrous beast charging into the lines of shiny-armoured, spear-wielding humans I think I got there!
This was done straight onto the computer again in Painter X.
More demon designs, this time drawn directly onto the computer (I usually start with a physical sketch). These are the foot-soldiers; enthusiastic cannon fodder for the demon legions. All the troops start their existence as a larval demon (the correct rituals, feeding and sacrifices create different troop types).
My brother had the idea for the demon spawn; failed, malformed demons from who usually get eaten or very occasionally adopted as mascots. Somewhat like the wormy creatures that emerged from The Trapdoor (an old UK TV stop-motion cartoon show, have a look if you’ve not heard of it!).
This is a page of demons for a comic strip (perhaps a web-comic?). First we have a variety of warped demon Warlocks with long fingernails to weave their magic and weird cowls that remind me of rickshaws. Then we have a nasty looking Overseer who uses his whip to send the demon berserkers into a frenzy.
Here’s an old image of some freaky mutant pirates I designed years ago (as I am drawing piratical things at the moment). They’re chaotic mutants (the turbaned headed mutant is based on an Heironymus Bosch painting if I recall and Orb from Quake 3!).
I’m working on a few things right now (not paid work alas!); one of which is a composition involving various monsters and a Planar Alchemist. Here are a couple of pages (A5 and A3) of designs for the archaic re-breather and dimensional-hopping devices. The device is partly based on the Antikythera mechanism; as an historical example of an ancient computer. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antikythera_mechanism
Here are the larger drawings:
These are some designs for a planar alchemist; someone who uses alchemy to open portals between dimensions. 
And here are some pictures of the alchemical symbols that he would have on his robe. I tried to create a vaguely logical approach to these designs to add an element of authenticity.
