It’s that time of the month again – it’s ICE’s map contest! This time it’s a lair for Kobolds (a lesser goblin type creature).

I was going to enter the old-school hand drawn map that I uploaded here – old-school map but after I added a little bit of texture to it, I just had to carry on!

Here is the opening spread describing the tactics the kobold’s would use to defend their lair and a larger map view is below that.

And here’s a close up of the textures so you can see it at it’s actual size

This is the cover illustration used for the PDF depicting the nasty trap the Kobold’s have in store for unsuspecting adventurers!

Click those images for a larger version!

Finally, I’ve added an image gallery of some of my work!

Check it out – Craig’s Sketchpad Gallery

…and ironically, this post has no pictures.

I’ll also be adding a gallery at Craig John (the Blog) which will include more of the ‘design’ projects covering both web and print work but I’ll let you know when that happens.

After deciding to leave it as an old school style map, I couldn’t help myself and I had to colour it in and add some textures.

The story so far, the initial colour and textures have been added and now I need to colour in the other elements (the wood has just been started as a sold colour but needs more textures, highlights and shadows)…

And a close up of the textures.

As usual, click on the image for a larger version.

Once again, another ICE competition raises it’s head; This time in the form of a Kobold lair!

I’ve been looking through some of the b/w drawn maps and I like them. So much so that I thought my first entry would be in that style (and it meant I could draw it while watching TV).

I need to stick it in a PDF with separate pages tiling the map, but here it is in it’s full size form.

As usual, click the image for a larger version.

This is an entry into a chimera creature contest – the first of many.

I thought I’d start with something recognisable and I think the Griffin is perhaps the most well known of all the composite creatures. There’s a close-up and a whole image here and you can click on them to see the larger versions.

I’ve shown the source images in the main one so you can see the separate elements. All were edited in Photoshop CS3 (yes, I’ve still not bought the upgrade and as time progresses, I’ll probably wait for the CS5 version now).

Ah, once again I find myself wanting to create lost civilisations – but not the type we have nowadays with the Egyptians, Aztecs, Mayans etc (which are pretty cool themselves); I love the concept of a futuristic civilisation in ruins over thousands of years old.

This is a concept I’m going to go into a lot more detail for a while as well as futuristic civilisations that aren’t in ruins. It might be fun to have the same images side by side – current, and in ruins. Yes, there will be lots of overgrowth and decay.

This is just a rough render and composite to get the feel of what I’m doing but there will be a lot higher res versions soon!

This entry doesn’t have a larger version because it’s a rough concept so for a change, you can keep the clicking at bay.

While I’m on the subject, here’s one that I did earlier
…about 10yrs earlier to be precise. As you can see I have a long running fixation with dead civilisations – and sunsets as well it appears.

Fortunately, I’ve grown out of my need to have everything orange though.

Click on the image to play the movie – it’s 3.8MB

This was also an initial rough concept I made so it’s not a high quality render – and the plane is modelled out of standard shapes and isn’t textured at all.

This is what sparked my idea to do a short animation but thanks to ill health and work constraints, it never actually got finalised. Many of the models were created and textured so I may add them to this blog later.

This is something else I’ve been wanting to continue for a while…

I used to love space images as a child and I’m constantly scribbling spaceships and making little animations so I thought I’d throw some of these up here. …more to follow in the coming months.

Click the image for a larger version!

Something I started a long time ago and never managed to finish it. This is an A2 (594x420mm) image that I was going to have on my flat’s livingroom wall. I moved and there wasn’t a suitable place to put it so I never finished it.

I’m going to re-do this as far as the dragon’s concerned – I really like the fire I did so I’m keeping that! (I used many different images of explosions and I comp’ed them together to make the fire)

In the meantime, I thought I’d stick it here.

Here’s a closer image. The textures I used for the leathery Dragon’s Wing was a scan of my hand print.

Click away for the larger images!

For a closer look, click on one of the 4 sections to enlarge them.

I thought I’d show you the Map on it’s own which makes it easier to see.

Click for that larger version.