Tabla de contenidos para August 2025 en ImagineFX

The End Is Nigh YEAR CREATED: 2024 MEDIA: Photoshop “In what is a seemingly peaceful world, technological advancements have made human life more beautiful, but behind this tranquillity lies an ancient evil force. And this force is about to awaken, signalling the impending destruction of the world. The hero has fallen, his heart clutched in the demon’s grasp, declaring their arrival and the despair to come. Will new justice rise, or will the world await its doom?” Discover your potential with The Rookies; the launchpad for emerging digital artists. With The Rookies, your work won’t only be seen, it gets noticed and featured, just like this! Join a community where your journey from hobbyist to professional artist is supported every step of the way.  WWW.THEROOKIES.CO Artist PROFILE Ang Jun Wei LOCATION:…

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Even when video games were little more than rudimentary pixels on a black screen, art has played an important role in sparking players’ imaginations, whether it’s what decorates the side of an arcade cabinet or the illustration on a game box. While there are huge advances in technology in how games can look today, that vision still has to take shape from somewhere, which makes the concept art an essential part of game development. Yet it’s perhaps not always that well understood as a profession, especially as the very term of “concept” may have you assuming it’s primarily only a focus at the start of a development cycle. “I think it’s probably one of the least understood jobs,” says Paul Scott Canavan, who has worn a number of hats in…

“This artwork features my character, X, who is a puppeteer on a mission to capture escaped demons. I created this piece during a workshop at Underpaint Academy with Victor Maury, where I explored the various techniques that are used in League of Legends splash art. One of my goals was to design a strong composition that subtly forms the shape of X’s name. Although there are four characters in the scene, I focused on making X’s face the clear focal point. I used wedges – sharp shadow shapes that accentuate form – to guide the viewer’s eye. His face and hands have the highest contrast and detail, while the rest of the painting supports the flow without competing for attention. This project was a jump into cold water for me…

This piece tells the story of Nix, a deep gnome druid of the Circle of Spores. She was originally a Dungeons & Dragons character that my wife played in one of our party campaigns. Nix is a chaotic soul; she’s messy, disorganised, obsessed with mushrooms, and constantly drawn to strange and dangerous places in search of rare fungi. This illustration captures one of those adventurous moments. I begin by designing the character, experimenting with the outfit and personality cues. Nix usually wears a fully covered outfit, but I imagined her forgetting her cloak in a rush to chase a particularly rare mushroom. Next I dived into research, studying the Underdark and its inhabitants. Myconids, mushroom-like creatures, felt like the perfect addition, both visually and thematically. From there, I worked through…

Price From £999/$999 (13-inch) /£1,199/$1,199 (15-inch, model tested) Company Apple Web www.apple.com This has to be Apple’s best laptop. It’s not the most powerful, but there’s nothing quite like the MacBook Air for wow factor when you pull it out of the box. The M4 chip refresh brings with it 16GB of RAM as standard and a slight price drop when compared to the M3 model. Ultimately the Air is a superb laptop, but won’t cope with heavy workloads as well as a MacBook Pro. As such, it’s ideal for the travelling artist or 2D designer; highly portable, yet immensely capable. The 15-inch MacBook Air we put through its paces wasn’t a graphics monster like you’d find in some PCs, but its 10-core GPU is still a little better than…

Price £680/$800 Company Boulies Web https://boulies.co.uk Many of us spend extended periods working at a desk, sitting for hours on end daily, and that can have significant effects on our health such as energy levels or severe muscle and joint problems. A height-adjustable desk is a great way to combat this and there are options available, from desk toppers with adjustable sections to be used on an existing desk, to fully motorised desks, such as Boulies’ MagVida here. You receive everything you need including the tools to put it together and a short but clear manual. The build quality is excellent. Everything fits as it should, the construction is flawless, and the desktop finish comes with a slight texture that looks and feels premium, as well as stopping items from…

For the last 20 years I’ve worked almost exclusively with digital tools for commissioned jobs. At the beginning, I would be sketching my art on paper, scanning, and then colouring with Photoshop. Later on I had the chance to get a Wacom Cintiq tablet, and at that point paper and pencils basically disappeared from my life. But since AI-generated art has become so prominent, a few months ago I decided to go back to basics in protest, and to feel the texture of the paper, the sound of pencils scratching, the dirty hands, and working without the safety net of being able to hit Ctrl+Z. Each time I start a drawing with pencil and paper, I feel like a total newbie. But I love how the final results – and…

Drawings and paintings take on a whole new dimension when they’re used to create a game world. As emotive as animated films and TV shows can be, there’s nothing as special and engrossing as being immersed in a setting where you can dwell on and influence a moment rather than watching it pass by. Sometimes the atmosphere, emotion and mystery of just one piece of artwork is enough to inspire an entire game concept. Japanesestyled RPG Eastward was conceived when artist Hong Moran sketched a “weird monster dormitory building” that resembled the once infamous Kowloon Walled City of Hong Kong, an overpopulated, anarchic and hellish-sounding enclave that was demolished in 1994. “We got excited about the design and came up with a game that would fit around the aesthetic,” says…

Ditching Photoshop Hi guys. I just read your latest issue and it’s really opened my eyes. I’ve been a Photoshop user for years and have felt it was the best option for my art. I’m not a fan of subscription-based software but didn’t really think I had any other options. I knew other apps were out there but I’m really grateful you showed them off in more detail. I think I can now make the move to something new and bin the Adobe subscription. Alex, via email Rob replies Hi Alex. Thanks for getting in touch, and I’m very pleased to hear you found that round-up useful. Other than finding the best way to use your budget, I think exploring other software can be artistically interesting; different methods, new tools, and varying…

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This commission was created for Pam Dougherty, the English voice actress of Charlotte Linlin, also known as Big Mom, from One Piece. I was asked to take inspiration from a scene within the anime where Charlotte goes on a rampage! However, this brief had a unique request. The art was to be created in a style I hadn’t used in three years! Several factors had seen me migrate to a more line-art dependent style for client work and now here I was, asked to use a process I wasn’t convinced would be used commercially. I was initially concerned about how rusty I’d be but was relieved to see how much of my skill remained in muscle memory. I even managed to adapt some of what I’d learned from my regular…

Price £60/$80 Company Redmagic Web https://redmagic.gg RATING Power banks and chargers aren’t the most exciting bit of equipment for a creative on the move, but they can be essential. Redmagic is a brand that’s made a bit of a name for itself selling Android phones and tablets, but its entry into the power bank market couldn’t be further from a plain rectangle – it looks like something straight off the set of Star Trek. It’s a compact object, and can be used to charge devices both at home and on the move. It is, however, only currently available with a two-pin US plug. Alongside the captive USB-C cable/carrying handle, there’s a single USB-C port to charge the bank. You get 65W of direct charging while plugged in, with 20W PD…

Affinity Photo Custom Brush Pack Artist Art Design Studio Software Affinity Photo/Designer Brushes 180 Price £10.94/$14 Rating A massive set of pattern and paint brushes for both Affinity Photo and Designer. They are raster brushes only, but with the combined workflow this shouldn’t get in the way. Be aware they haven’t been tested on mobile or tablet.  https://bit.ly/4jU1MyT Krita Brush Pack V1 Artist Missooni Software Krita Brushes 13 Price Free Rating A great set of starter brushes for everyone’s favourite free art package Krita, which are easy to install and use with excellent results — and available for free, they’re hard to beat. https://ko-fi.com/s/ae840a75c3 200+ Glitch Photoshop Brushes Artist Resource Boy Software Photoshop Brushes 200+ Price Free Rating Weirdly, having a set of brushes that can be used to ‘break’…

What is your main source of inspiration? So much of my inspiration comes from stories. Old fairy tales have often inspired me and given me ideas to play with. Lately, I’ve been working to improve my watercolour painting, so I’ve also been creating many landscapes, which helps me focus on technique. Seeing what other artists have done also gives me a lot of ideas. As a young artist, were there fictional worlds that gave you a desire to create your own? There was a TV show that my parents would record onto VHS tapes called Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre, and a lot of my love for fairy tales came from watching it. I enjoyed seeing how they could tell the story of Cinderella in one way, and Disney could…

I’ve been working in this studio for around three years now, and I feel pretty lucky to own it. My previous studio was a loft I converted, but it was a relatively compact space. My wife and I walked past this house often and then saw it up for sale. We’d always admired it, partly because of its size, privacy and history, but for me I always loved the look of the outside studio, which had a twisty staircase on the exterior of the house leading up to it. At the time it was being rented as a studio apartment, before that it was an Airbnb, and even earlier was used as a full-size snooker room. “I always loved the studio’s exterior, which has a twisty staircase on the outside”…

The expectations were high for the second season of Arcane. The series, which is set in Riot Games’ hugely popular League of Legends universe, was an instant hit with fans of the franchise and new viewers alike when it was first released on Netflix in 2021. To give audiences the pay off they deserved, the creative team wanted to take every aspect of the show to the next level for its follow up. The success of Arcane can be put down to its gripping plot, engaging characters and stunning visuals. This is also true for the second season, which first aired in November of last year and topped the Netflix charts in over 60 countries. The result of eight years of production work, Seasons One and Two were produced almost…

Doom has been a massive inspiration throughout my career. I love the blending of sci-fi and organic elements with religious imagery, everything looks heavy and badass, and the soundtracks always gets me in the mood to paint. So it was a dream come true when Bethesda contacted me to work on the cover for its latest title, Doom: The Dark Ages. This was going to be a big project and time was tight, so efficiency was the name of the game. The Dark Ages takes the franchise in a new direction with an overtly fantasy setting. The Doom Slayer has his classic array of guns but is now accompanied by a shield and mace. Stressing the fantasy aspect of the game through the cover was important, so right off the…

“This piece of concept artwork is an early exploration of Himeji Castle for Assassin’s Creed Shadows. After researching the location and time period, I mapped the castle’s layout to get an idea of the different spaces and their functions. A 2D sketch helped me figure out the composition. For this shot, I wanted a high angle to give the player a view of the layout and the different options for infiltration. I then worked in 3D to block out the castle’s basic shapes. This enabled me to understand the spatial design of the castle, which is an important factor for the gameplay. The image was then taken across to Photoshop where I added illustrative details. By conducting proper research of the castle, I was able to save a lot of…

Price From £599/$599 (11-inch), £799/$799 (13-inch) Company Apple Web www.apple.com The 2025 edition of the iPad Air, its 13-inch incarnation at least, feels like an iPad Pro. It has the same flat sides and heft in the hand but has the powerful M3 chip inside. The extra processing grunt means apps like Affinity Photo and the iPad versions of Photoshop and DaVinci Resolve absolutely fly, and the Apple Pencil Pro makes it ideal for sketching. There’s a keyboard case that turns it into a kind of laptop, and the USB-C port means there’s no scrabbling for a compatible charger. It’s not cheap, but with a surprisingly reasonable starting price (though you’re going to want to upgrade the base specs, which gets expensive fast), this might be the best tablet for…

Publisher Udemy Price £60/$120 for course or Udemy Personal Plan £15/$20 monthly Format Online Length 5 hrs 17 mins Web www.udemy.com Brad Colbow is an artist and YouTuber we’ve been following for more than a decade now. He’s always been consistently excellent in his extensive range of reviews, guides and opinions about all the tools, techniques and equipment needed to be a digital illustrator. That’s why we were pleased to see this Udemy course from him, which dives into every aspect of how to use Procreate. The course structure begins with an introduction to the software’s basics and features. Brad doesn’t actually start drawing until around 30 minutes into the course. Some may think his descriptions are too in-depth, but we felt his style of explaining “everything with side notes”…