Process Video: 1988

As an exclusive perk for our paid subscribers, we present this video showing the step by step creation of Stan!'s cartoon homage to "Greyhawk Adventures."

This week’s cartoon homage was another one with complicated bits, but unlike recent ones it WASN’T because of the number of detailed characters in the image. In fact, some might say that the griffin mount is the ONLY character that is rendered in any particular detail.

The warrior riding the griffin is wearing a relatively uncomplicated suit of armor, and is looking three-quarters away from the viewer—not to mention that his face is pretty deeply shadowed—and much of the foreground detail is lost in the pure white glow of his magic sword. The antagonist atop the spire is so wreathed in shadows that it took a high resolution image of the original painting before I was some kind of dragon rather than an obscure demon or even a strange bat-winged mountain fortress. And I’m STILL not sure that the glowing creature swooping around the peak is meant to be the standard avian that I drew it as (for my own purposes I decided it was something like a celestial eagle).

I reached out to friends and colleagues (several of whom have been guests on the show already … while the others will be in future weeks), and none of them were able to clear up the situation (although they did for the most part agree with my interpretations).

In the end, I’m pleased with the drawing I turned out … and I’m happy that it represents what _I_ see in the cover. I’m just not sure how faithful it is to the artist’s or writer’s original vision.

Subscribers to this newsletter got to see this drawing last week, whereas the general public are only just getting their first glimpses of it today. But there’s still something left that’s JUST for the paid subscribers—a process video showing the step-by-step creation of this cartoon homage. (If you’re currently a free subscriber, now would be a great time to upgrade.)