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Composition process!

I started off looking at dynamic shots initially, which I thought would be very interesting, but after a discussion inclass decided that I would push my boundaries and try to do it in a nordic style. With inspirations from Song of the Sea and artist Hellanim, I think I was successful in this, but it is very clearly a digital piece. In the future I would like to draw it more traditionally and maybe even try some rock carving.

Because of the traditional nordic style being 2d, I wanted to show dimension through the lighting. I wanted the sections to look like a shadow box, but very clearly hone into the subjects in the middle. I think this was successful in the end product.

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All colour iterations + Final design

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Playing with forms

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Some more inspiration along with some sketches- exploring her possible original form as a water deity.

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The last Artist I'm interested in is contemporary Czech artist "Hellanim". Hellanim created a wonderful series of card sized art made by ink, and paint pens.

I love their stylised angles, fluid lines and simple 3 toned colours, and am interested in portraying my work in the same old illustration card type of style.

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Peter Nicolai Arbo was a traditional 17th century Swedish painter who focused primarily on illustrating norse historical motifs and norse mythology.

Whilse I think his painting are lovely I'm not interested in replicating his style more than the chiaroscuro he displays in all of his art.

I think the dichotomy of the darkness compared to the lighter faded backgrounds are great to emphasis the seriousness and yet unreal worlds he portrays.

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Here is the design I’m going with currently, the form is a moving wave of fish with a culmination at the top and four massive tendril arms emitting from the sides.

I’ve now renamed the character to be Morueldr, sea fire. Old norse for glowing algae.

Initially Morueldr was a water deity created by the wish of men asking for safe travel in the night. For 500 years she carried her duty before meeting a human man named Viðfinnr and birthing two children, Baki and Bil. One day while they were fetching water from a well they were kidnapped my Mani, the manifestation of the moon and became craters and the phases of the moon. 

Heartbroken and grieving, Morueldr began to lack her duty, and wonder aimlessly in the sea until she began to be eaten by norse cod. Memories of her children then began to be relived in the cod as they connected to her mind. Wanting to keep their memories contained, she allowed herself to be consumed by the fish and became a hive mind. With this consumption she is slowly going insane. She relives the memory of her children in false peace and then has moments of clarity when she wants to save her children and becomes enraged.

Morueldr allows herself to be eaten to expand her mass and gain more power, but by doing so loses her sanity bit by bit.

Each fish is an important memory of her children, so when a human mistakenly kills one she unleashes her wrath upon them fully.

Her end goal is to be able to attack the moon and crack it open to retrieve and save her children- but by doing so will have to sacrifice the memories she’s held of them and the majority of herself.

She talks in multiple voices and has constant mood swings. She’s incredibly protective and can hide in plain sight. Locals know to avoid fish with no faces and areas of rough sea and clear skies, or stormy weather with calm seas.

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In the first image I drew some studies with the sort of fish the hive mind could possibly be apart of, and how the reach could possibly be world wide. I also thought of the components of my character, and thought what could be the main opponents possibly.

In the second image I play with form again, deciding how pollution could possibly mix into the design and if the tendrils could be purely water or just more fish.

In the third image i try and simplfy the design and the fourth I try and visualise it in the world.

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Here are some iterations influenced by the references below. 

My favourite design of the lot was the bottom right, as I liked for the coral growing out of its head along with the seaweed, that would have to later be changed into garbage with it hiding in the modern era.

The small figure top left I found was interesting as well, mainly with its mostly removed body and the octopus arms, although the arms are currently presented as four for my quadrivium prompt along with the having it disabled with my arctic tern research, I’d want it to be a more significant disablement if included.

I’m not very fond of the fish face, but am unsure how to incorporate a proper face into the design. I’ll iterate more.

Apart from that, I like the idea of faceless fish swimming around the entirety of the ocean, and for them to be recognised as a bad omen, and to not eat/kill due to stories of villages and sailors being attacked by a large beast.

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My visual references for my character ‘Faget Vesen’,

On the top are some images I was using for the creature itself, and below are the art styles I was thinking of using to draw it in.

I love the thin lines of Swedish painter John Bauer’s highly detailed style, as well as his subdued colouring and the shapes he uses to make his creature illustrations. Bauer’s method to illustrating involved making small thumbnails (no bigger than a stamp) and then redrawing it progressively in size until it reached it’s final resolution (usually around 20-25 centimetres). His earlier works were printed in one colour and black due to ink costing too much. When not printed in ink, he worked primarily in gouache and watercolour. If I go with this style I would be interested in exploring his method of illustration along with limiting the colour palette to make it look cohesive and older.

In comparison however I think that the traditional art used to portray the gods would make it look slightly more authentic. If I don’t recreate it in the art style I’m interested in incorporating the carvings into its design.

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Deciding my characters ambitions and backstory, as well as how its hive mind worked in the world.

Currently, my idea was to make it a creature born from a shard of the moon dropping and falling to the earth. It is born from being consumed by a shell, and then the fish that consumed it slowly became it as well. 

In Norse mythology Mani is the personification of the moon, I thought it would be interesting if the creature thought of them as separate and instead thought of the moon as being trapped by mani. Its end goal would be to want to destroy mani and steal the moon- which would cause catastrophe and is the reason why mani and his family along with some sea gods try to destroy him. This man hunt causes him to go into hiding, eventually leading to him being spread throughout the ocean and his mass form hiding in pollution to keep him safe and bide his time (making him sick).

Another more peaceful route was to make his fish be the craters in the moon, and so once a month he travels to the moon to reunite with his family.

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(Unfortunately due to issues with my scanner all pictures will be photos from now on)

Some iteration sketches from my research, as well as some drawn iterations from my classmate. I really liked the octopus features and am interested in how to incorporate them further!

In my first page I drew mindlessly from my research, the idea of a man with four limbs that I could make interesting came to mind, along with an aquatic creature that just travels and blends in with its surroundings. On the bottom left I explored the idea of it being a mechanic on a navy ship, but have it less human and much more abstract.

Liking the abstract idea, on the second page I explored water as a malleable form for the character. The inspiration came from the moon, with the arctic tern being able to travel to the moon and back (approximately) 3 times in its lifetime.

The idea of a hive mind then formed when I drew an interesting shape with fish. I thought it would be interesting to have them seperate mostly and then form together whenever it acted as one.

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Bird study of the Artic Tern.

I really liked how curved the birds were in their actions and looks.