February MOTM: Shadow/smoke monster concept sketch + design commentary // sfw

here's the two concept sketches i ended up doing for february's monster of the month, a smoke/shadow monster! you could view it as either two variations on the same type of monster, or as the same character having a kind of fluid form - which i think would make sense with a smoke/shadow-themed monster, his element being inherently changeable. i'm thinking that his form is more 'solid' and detailed when he's at his strongest (during the night-time, in deep darkness, or in the company of other shadow beings), and then looking more washed-out, hazy, and unrefined when he's surrounded by bright light or otherwise weakened. his basic anatomy is kind of a ''standard were-creature'' (in lack of a better term), but he can essentially 'absorb' shadow matter to change his form - he can grow bigger, sprout more limbs, possibly cover himself in a thick charcoal-y coating, and so on. 

like already mentioned elsewhere i ended up turning him into an OC, i just couldn't resist. i named him Sau, and found a way to fit him into our rp-verse: he's a guardian spirit in the service of these divine (ish) beings called vhul'a mothers. the vhul'a is a species of shadow spirits, and you could compare them to an ant colony in that the mother is the queen, and then there's different 'classes' of vhul'a, like 'workers' and soldier/warrior vhul'a - Sau belongs to the latter category. he's big and adept at fighting, but not so skilled in magic or rituals. 

drawing smoke and shadow is a challenge. i like to draw it this way, where it looks like flames, like it's flickering and undulating and gravitating upwards like fire. i drew it the same way in the painting, but with the sketch i instead used various special effect brushes to achieve a somewhat different look. even then, i wanted to give the impression that the character has a more or less solid form, which included making parts of his body have a well-defined outline and shading his features rather than just leave him hazy and 'flat,' as if he was just a patch of shadow that your hand would go through if you tried to touch him. but i didn't want him to look too solid, either, and that's why i'm happy with the idea to have a dark skeleton be visible through his body. 

on the sketch you can (sort of) see that both his tongues and his cock is actually kind of see-through, too, and i doubt his internal organs are fully normal in general. i feel like he's probably just full of shadow matter - if you stabbed him some dark gloop would spill out, and then he could patch himself up with pure darkness. i wouldn't say his 'skeleton' is bone, either - he's a shadow being imitating organic, mortal life, but in a kind of half-formed, superficial way. 

on that note, the little skull is not "his" skull, it's kind of just ... glued on. you could remove the skull and his head would have the same shape, jaw opening up to reveal black teeth and that long thick tongue of his. i'm thinking that either 1) he slapped a skull onto his faceless shadow head in an attempt to blend in with normal mortal creatures, which imo would be quite adorable; 2) it's a scare tactic, warrior vhul'a being made to look intimidating and adorning themselves accordingly; 3) it's a leftover from when he was created, since some vhul'a mothers create some of their vhul'a children by combining shadow matter with various materials - for example animal carcasses or bones - and ritually imbuing them with life.

---

and i think that's it for my first ever MOTM concept art/design commentary post! absolutely comment below if you have any questions, i'll be happy to answer them.

art + character © me.