12 Fantasy Characters

Tuesday 17 October 2020

Since a small boy I was fascinated by animation and in awe of the fantastical characters, worlds and moving images that animators create through multiple drawings. To be an animator was definitely one of my dreams but that didn’t happen and now many years later I can enjoy some parts of that dream by creating characters through photo artistry. Creating the 12 Once Upon A Time characters was very much experimental and a learning curve, trying different mediums from creating costumes and headgears for physical photo shoots to creating costumes digitally from photographic and design elements. The end result is a mixture of photography, digital painting and photo artistic effects.

Thank you to all the models that were photographed in my home studio and especially for letting me dress them up in make-up and fantasy costumes.

I found the most exciting part of creating these characters, by moulding and transforming the faces of the characters in photoshop, using the Liquify Tool, recreating the facial shapes and features to become the witch, the villain or the elf with a big nose and ears. This is followed by the final touches with the paintbrush tool and adding hight lights and shadows for blending. I find this transformation a very exciting creative process.

Over the years I have realised the importance of ready extracted elements for a quick workflow. Part of what I enjoy about creating photo illustrations and artistry is digging through my arsenal and finding the perfect element for my artwork. After creating a digital element and texture package for The Kaizen course by Sebastian Michaels, I came aware of how satisfying and exciting it is to create for other artists and then to see glimmers of my designs in their creations. This motivated me to start making my own elements available for artists and create bespoke designs in my style. I hope you enjoy the elements and designs that I offer in my digital shop.