Making Of: Demolition Mech

Environment concept artist, Edvige Faini, demonstrates the steps she took to create her destructive image, Demolition Mech, in Photoshop...

I started with the idea to do a 2.0 version of THE DESTROYER, an image that I created a few months ago (to see it visit here). My goal was to re-design the entire mech in order to give him more appeal.

Usually I love to start immediately with colors, so I set a gradient color background using the Gradient tool (Fig.01).

(Fig.01)

(Fig.01)

I chose a tone of green because I wanted to give an unhealthy atmosphere to this apocalyptic scene (Fig.02).

(Fig.02)

(Fig.02)

Then I started with a very simple sketch of some building silhouettes (Fig.03).

(Fig.03)

(Fig.03)

During the entire process I used three standard Photoshop brushes (Fig.04).

(Fig.04)

(Fig.04)

• Soft Round brush for soft transition, smoke and haze
• Hard Round brush
• Sampled Brush to achieve texture effects

At this point I decided to develop the composition on an incline plain to give to the scene a greater sense of dynamism and drama.

Then using a Soft Round brush I added haze and smoke in order to push the city into the background, creating the impression of a place under attack (Fig.05).

(Fig.05)

(Fig.05)

Then, with a quick sketch using the Hard Round brush; I started to introduce the figure of the mech. I decided on purpose to leave some parts of it out of the composition to emphasize his proportions. In this phase I tried to define the volumes and shapes of the mech, and I decided to arm it with a laser beam exactly as a spider shoots its thread. This laser will be his weapon of destruction (Fig.06).

(Fig.06)

(Fig.06)

In Fig.07-08 I added more details on the mech and continued using only brushes to give it a painterly feel.

(Fig.07)

(Fig.07)

(Fig.08)

(Fig.08)

Then I started to focus a little more on the laser beam, and especially on how the hard surfaces of the mech were reflecting lights. I also added some LED lights to the armor. I gave a sense of incandescence later on when the composition was almost complete (Fig.09).

(Fig.09)

(Fig.09)

At this stage I started to feel the need to make the mech interact with another object, so in the lower-right corner I decided to put a complementary subject in the scene; a sort of military truck escaping from the mech monster.

I sketched the silhouette like his trailer was experiencing high speed torsion and violent swerves, just to make it more dynamic (Fig.10).

(Fig.10)

(Fig.10)

To give more power to the laser beam I used a picture of an explosion I found on the web (Fig.11).

(Fig.11)

(Fig.11)

I selected the fire area with the Lasso tool and dragged it on to my painting, then converted it on a Screen mode level (Fig.12).

(Fig.12)

(Fig.12)

I duplicated and scaled the layer to move it on to the building in order to add more fire and a sense of destruction (Fig.13).

(Fig.13)

(Fig.13)

Time to light the fire! I created a new layer that I filled in black using the Paint Bucket tool and then converted it to a Color Dodge mode (Fig.14). Our black layer became transparent; at this point I used a brush and a warm yellow and orange color to paint over the lights in order to make them incandescent and bright.

(Fig.14)

(Fig.14)

I also added trails of missiles in the sky to give the suggestion of an anti-aircraft presence (Fig.15).

(Fig.15)

(Fig.15)

Arriving at the final steps, I wanted to spend more time on the explosion caused by the laser, in order to add as much realism as I could by painting debris and sparks of fire using my brushes. I also added haze and smoke, especially behind the giant mech, to separate it more from the background (Fig.16).

(Fig.16)

(Fig.16)

I love to play with light, so using the Color Dodge layer again I spent more time illuminating my mech with other touches of orange and yellow to the armor, especially the parts most exposed to the explosive light (Fig.17). I added a touch of blue to end this phase and jumped to the final tuning.

(Fig.17)

(Fig.17)

I added final touches to set the ultimate colors of the scene. I gave the painting a warmer tone and a bit of contrast using a Curves Adjustment Layer and - voilà - The DEMOLITION MECH was finished!

The final image

The final image

Related links

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