This week's theme and brief by previous winner, JosephCow
Crimson Character of the Week #31
Grand Inquisitor
"Whether from the Middle Ages, or an alien planet, the Grand Inquisitor is going to eliminate heresy wherever they find it!
Historically religious inquisitors conducted investigations to find people not following religious law, and were granted special judicial privileges, making them at times judge and jury. Could be good or evil character, or even an rpg character class, up to you. "
The best of the CHOWs will be picked by an anonymous poll in the Finals thread and the winner is given the opportunity to pick the theme of the next CHOW's design, as well as becoming the title banner for that week! So go hard, design something interesting and unique!
Guidelines:
No photograph paint overs, must be 100% original work. (See next rule for exception)
3D is permitted and renders MAY be used as whole or in part of a painting, as long as YOU created the work. Pre-made and/or purchased, online, assets are forbidden.
There is no restriction on the character's gender, time period or culture.
Studies are recommended, but not required.
There is no restriction on image formats (horizontal, vertical, square).
Environment backgrounds are optional.
Keep in mind you are not required to stick to what is in the passage. It is more of a guide in terms of mood.
Rules:
You must post at least one WIP in the WIP thread to be accepted into the final poll.
Finals must be posted in the finals thread before the deadline.
At least 3/4 of the character must be visible (minimum from the knees up).
Only ONE submission per person in the finals thread.
No fanart. We want to see your original, unique interpretations!
Voting will be held for 5 days after the deadline.
In an event of a tiebreaker, a winner will be chosen through a randomized name picker.
Hopefully other people feel like this is a cool challenge idea. I just finished reading a book called Name of the Rose which was about an inquisition in a 1300's monastery, and recently played a similar puzzle game whose main character was an inquisitor, so I was like, okay let's do this!
My first idea was to do kind of an mmo character select style design, with red robes and kind of a chunky 3D look, but I realized he just kind of looked like a wizard, and I had not really done anything interesting with the concept so I went back to the drawing board and came up with something with more storytelling, shot a few refs and here's what I have so far.
I am going for kind of a grim 19th century look, I feel like that setting is easily associated with religious fanatacism and feels more real and frightening than something ages and ages ago. So this character is like a religious arm of an authoritarian religious movement that finds heretic camps and books and burns them.
Working more on it, keeping the overall composition but adding more values in between so it's not completely raw looking. It takes away somewhat from the impact of the hard shapes, but adds more sense of space I think.
Oh nice, again, I like the classic feel of your work, even in your first drafts you add dimension early on where others might start quite flat. I do feel like the angle, framing and the lighting is identical to the matador piece.
I had a busy week and popped my DnD cherry on the weekend so I will be late joining this party, but I'll make it!
Only have a thumbnail and flag emblem so far. Standard religious tyrannical inquisition. I figured I'd try to draw out a scene this time - might be more than I can get done in time but worth a shot.
Yeah you have a point, I was thinking that too. I wouldn't say identical but it's definitely similar. I'm hoping this one can be an improvement on the matador one which had some weird drawing things that I didn't like.
I really like the scene you have going so far! That actually seems like a more classical painting take on it, the guy on the horse gives it that. but you can't really go wrong there. looking forward to seeing where you take it
I really like the self rightous look of Josephs character, it looks like he is burning the whole forest alongside with the books..
When looking at RottenPockets sketch for the first time I thought it was a skeleton Inqusitor, like the dead reigning over the living. But a classical Inqusitor will do nicely too, I look forward to how it will develop :)
This is my female Inquisitor in front of her church. I wanted her to look innocent, but I am not sure if she is good or evil. This is also the point where I always stop having so much fun painting and not really knowing how to go on with what I have. Like painting over it, or trying to make a cleaner sketch etc. But I hope to push through and finish this.
Awh it looks good! Sorry you missed the date! It's a cool idea having a kind of double weapon staff thing, I was thinking of doing something like that as well.
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