Let’s switch gears and take a look at some progress shots from a horror/psychedelic piece I did a couple of years back, about one of my favorite movie characters, The Abominable Dr. Phibes. I did this as a vector piece for the most part, figuring that using zillions of shape layers would add a subtle angularity and therefore a dimension of unreality to the piece. I also wanted to use super crazy saturated colors, so having a ton of solid and transparent little shapes that couldn’t really blend and get muddy like paints to also helped. I was pretty darned happy with how it came out, honestly! Looking at the progress shots really kind of cracks me up though, especially the initial sketch. He almost reminds me of The Grinch Who Stole Christmas…

Also, if you notice the first sketch says “Impressions of Africa.” For some reason I was thinking of the Dali painting of that name when I conceived this piece. I forget why…maybe because Vincent Price as Dr. Phibes reminds me a little bit of Dali at his most dramatic. Dali certainly paints himself in a theatrical way in “Impressions of Africa.” I tried to mirror Dali’s pose a bit in the sweeping gesture of Dr. Phibes, but by the end of it I’d forgotten about Dali and had no thoughts other than making it as lurid as possible. Hopefully I succeeded!