January MOTM: the heat of embers - concept sketch + design commentary // sfw

thanks again to shae & coldau for suggesting a monster of the month design involving glowing embers!

from the start  i had a pretty good idea of how to illustrate the ember aesthetic, as based on the smouldering charcoals of a fire. i wanted to combine the warm and orange glow from within with the blue-ish ash that covers the outside of embers when they start to cool and the 'scaly' look of dark charcoal chunks after the heat is all gone.

my first order of business was to establish a basic anatomical framework. the initial draft looked like a classic fangs beefcake, but i decided to tweak and stylise some of the proportions to give this monster a somewhat different silhouette. i kept re-drawing his body and experimented with exaggerating different areas until i was happy with the fundamental outline.

he's still a big lad, but has a distinct look. the shoulders are a little too angular, the waist looks brittle compared to the rest of his body, and he seems to skip leg day. his lower arms seem almost uncomfortably big and chunky relative to his upper arms, and his hands are equally meaty. i thought about giving him thick feet, like the feathered hooves of a draft horse -- but ultimately opted for little cleft hooves instead. his whole vibe looks pretty demonic and i don't think i have designed any demons with goat feet, so i figured it was about time i gave a nod to that classic detail.  his tail, on the other hand, is really oversized and looks quite heavy and unwieldy, since it's thicker than much of his body. you could say that his proportions are intentionally imbalanced -- his small hooves shouldn't be able to carry his body, he shouldn't be able to raise his arms, his waist should snap from the weight of his torso, and how the hell does he lift that big ol' tail?

again, his body is partially covered with what looks like chunks of charcoal, irregularly jutting out and giving him an asymmetrical and uneven outline. charred wood looks different depending on how long it's burned and how much it's broken apart -- chunks of charcoal can be rounded or angular, turn into small bits and flakes, and the surface can be smooth, ridged, cracked, or kind of scaly. i used irregular sizes and shapes for the coal pieces and chose to draw them in a way that resembles armour-like plating. however, i felt like the design had enough going on without adding the veiny texture of wood or the powdery look of ash -- my focus was on the shapes and colours, so i only added hints of texture to the surface. but the charcoal is just a partial casing around an ember body, if that makes sense, so wherever there's a fissure or opening between the "scales" you can see the internal ember glow.

$10+ patrons may remember that in a couple of my HTM tutorials i've shown example sketches of sideways mouths -- in other words, a maw that splits the monster's head vertically instead of horizontally. i've wanted to incorporate this feature in a proper design for a while, and now was a great opportunity. i planned to highlight the mouth by filling it with a warm glow, so drawing it sideways would draw even more attention to it. from there i thought of giving him a second mouth at the end of his tail. this is also an older idea that i once considered for an previous monster of the month (the alien lover), but i didn't use it then. this guy already had one weird maw so i figured i might as well give him another, right? his tail mouth is horizontal and much bigger, but otherwise has the same appearance as the one on his face. the teeth lack detail, because the focus is on the contrast between the glowing inside vs the dark outside.

at first glance it seems like an ember theme comes along with the pretty obvious colours of fire, ash, and charcoal.  but even then you can choose different undertones and colour combinations to tailor the palette to your preferences. just do a picture search of "embers" and have a look at the differences in hue, which vary depending on factors like the heat of the fire when the image  was taken, the time of day, the exposure, and photo editing. for example, the glow could be a very bright yellow, blood red, or a more muted orange; the ashy bits could seem grey, blue, or pink; and the dark charcoal parts could be black, brown, or even blue.

i decided to combine a relatively muted orange with blue-toned ash and dark indigo/black charcoal. i say relatively muted orange because it's still glowing, but it's not as bright and saturated as it could have been as if i had used more yellow and/or white for the "heart" of the glow. orange and blue are complementary colours, so giving the ash and charcoal a blue undertone and blue "highlights" really adds some extra oumph.

as we all know i adore drawing beef, but this monster doesn't really have much defined musculature. some of the charcoal 'plates' mimic muscles (primarily the deltoids and pectorals) but again, focus is more on shapes and texture and on the contrast between the chunky charcoal next to the smoother glowy areas. the idea of having his ribs and pelvic bones 'flare out' came from wanting to add a unique flair (pun intended) to his silhouette beyond "just" exaggerating his proportions. it works really well with the idea of juxtaposing a glowing hot inside with a colder charcoal outside, and the shape of the flaring bones resemble the shapes of the charcoal "scales" and the stylised teeth.

something that looks a lot like lava can drip from any of the glowing parts of his body, but i'm mostly concentrating it to the tail mouth because it looks cool. little sparks fly off of him at all times and i imagine that when he's having a strong emotion it flares up, like a campfire when you toss on a new log. i can never resist the opportunity to draw some stylised fire or smoke, so i had to give him a 'mane' of flames that emanate from between two charcoal ridges running down each side of his neck.

designs like these always makes me think about how his lover(s) can survive touching his body or even being near, because i do imagine that the glow isn't just for show -- he is as hot as burning embers. i simply figure that it doesn't hurt to touch him unless he means it to, or that he can "un-heat" himself at will.  i've also decided that he smells like a cozy campfire and that he can make fiery sounds, ranging from a comforting crackling when he's happy (like a purring) to the roar of a huge pyre if he's pissed off.

// art + character © me.