Table of contents for May 2025 in ImagineFX

LOCATION: Brazil MEDIA: Photoshop, ZBrush WEB: https://caiommonteiro.artstation.com Caio has been drawing ever since he was a kid. He was introduced to Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons in the early 2000s, which began his passion for fantasy art. The two brands are now his main clients.…

 WWW.THEROOKIES.CO Long Live the King YEAR CREATED: 2024 MEDIA: Maya, Clip Studio Paint, Photoshop, Krita “I wanted to participate in the Golden ROI contest to create a more ambitious illustration than usual. It allowed me to work on several subjects at a time, from 3D blocking to painting and a bit of anatomy! It was also a great chance to try something different, as I’m not very used to this type of rendering.” Artist PROFILE Nawel Benrhannou LOCATION: France Nawel is a former game art student who graduated in 2021. She’s currently focusing on developing her artwork and skills with numerous projects, which are mostly set in fantasy or magical worlds. www.therookies.co/u/Nawii El Ombligo de la Luna YEAR CREATED: 2023 MEDIA: Photoshop “I created this image as an initial concept for…

“When I’m not inperson at an anime studio helping out with their projects, this is where I do most of my work,” Linnea explains. “My partner Bellamy and I have our work desks together, mine is on the left and hers is on the right. “We wanted to create a cute and comfy atmosphere to work on our projects together. Our main work is as keyframe supervisors, helping quality control the drawings of the animation in the Japanese anime pipeline to make sure that the characters are onmodel, the perspective is correct, and so on. In order to do this we’ll partially or fully redraw animation frames to make sure they match the look of the rest of the show. We also help to correct parts of the animation on…

“We had a colour script that was used to make the colours for the opening title sequence,” notes Kondo. “But the direction was to make it more psychedelic, and each frame impactful. The opening draws the viewer in and gets them invested in it, in addition to the opening being something that’s fun to watch, which is the main purpose of it.” Li adds: “I worked heavily with directions from Abel Góngora; he had a clear vision of what he wanted in the later parts of the opening. For when Okarun mimics where his balls once were, we had a discussion about whether to use blue or red for his aura because red was used in the show, but the director had a clear vision that it had to be…

“This piece started as a demo for my students, but then became a personal illustration. At first I focused on balancing the composition with different sizes of shapes, trying to arrange them in interesting ways. The glowing anomaly emerged almost by accident, but I liked how its reflections added dimensionality to the surrounding environment, so I decided to lean into it. Later I refined the mood and added figures to reinforce the scale and narrative. As a 2D artist, I think there’s strength to be found in abstraction – it’s a powerful way to approach complexity. Using different types of contrasts to design appealing solutions and simplify in a more deliberate way is key.” Artist PROFILE Clément Blum LOCATION: France Clément is a freelance concept artist and illustrator who is drawn…

Artist PROFILE Adolf Lachman LOCATION: Czech Republic Adolf is a Czech artist specialising in traditional drawing, digital painting and sculpting. He works for the independent game studio Amanita Design as lead 2D artist. https://bit.ly/3CSwF74 “This painting was originally created as a cover for the book Design in the Czech Lands 1900–2000, which chronicles a century of Czech applied arts. The name “Lachman” that you can see on the side of the Mechobot doesn’t refer to me, but Stanislav Lachman, a prominent Czech designer from the 1960s. It’s purely a coincidence that we share the same surname! Mechobot Under Ríp, combines the unknown Mechobot object with a traditional 19th-century Czech landscape oil painting. In this way it’s a literal parasite living off the original painting, offering new context that makes a fresh…

The latest digital art resources are put to the test by the ImagineFX team… Price From £2,350/$1,800 Company MSI Web www.msi.com The game is being taken to creative powerhouses like Apple’s MacBook Pro and Dell’s XPS 14. MSI’s market placement is obvious when you look at the specs, namely the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 laptop GPU. MSI is known for its primary focus on gaming laptops, which double as some of the best laptops around for running creative applications. That’s why it’s good to see MSI expanding its offering to creatives more directly. The metal chassis adopts a sleek aesthetic that oozes quality. At 2.1 kg it’s not exactly heavy, but think twice before transporting it, especially on a regular basis. The 16-inch display is large enough to use without…

Price From £1,300/$1,300 Company Apple Web www.apple.com Some might say the iMac doesn’t need to exist. In a world of smartphones, tablets and laptops, the static desktop computer has been increasingly sidelined over the years, to the point that it now arguably represents a niche, or even ‘luxury’, product. But Apple has remained faithful to its famous all-in-one, and while it won’t be an appropriate Mac for everyone, it’s a stunning machine for the right user. Of course, the iMac is almost all screen. The 24-inch (4,480 x 2,520) display is stunningly bright, and with the M4 model Apple has given the option to add a nano-texture display to reduce glare. It may add £200 to the cost, but the nano-texture display is a brilliant addition, providing a soft, matte…

“With Okarun, we see his skin becomes greyer, and his hair turns whiter. There’s a pattern or level to the extent of his transformation,” explains Hashimoto. “We have the regular Okarun, half-transformed Okarun, cursed Okarun, and we have a pattern or two where the hair transforms or he gets the mask on with the big teeth. Sometimes it’s the whole face or only part of it. Luckily, we had model sheets for all of those ready, but basically had to figure out on our end at which point the hair turns white or grey, how far the transformation needs to go for the various changes to occur. There was a lot of trial and error trying to work that out.”…

Artist PROFILE Edward Barons LOCATION: England Edward is a concept artist who primarily works on video games. He’s currently part of the team developing a variety of AAA games at Flix Interactive. https://bit.ly/4hMlo7l Everything around us tells a story, from the scuffs left on a house wall when someone was moving in, to the worn-away sections on famous statues that everyone touches as they walk past. Making an environment concept that feels like a believable place, no matter how outlandish the setting, often comes down to capturing these small details and placing yourself in the world. In this tutorial, I’ll share the steps I took in approaching a detailed personal project, how I keep my concepts moving and avoid getting stuck, and the thought process I go through to add life…

Price £555/$700 Company 3DMakerPro Web https://bit.ly/3CUj27s RATING 3DMakerPro’s Moose is a portable and lightweight scanning solution that’s perfect for first-time users and hobbyists. It’s still an excellent choice for those who are looking for an easy-to-use scanner. Set-up is a breeze; everything you need to get started is included in the package and the JMStudio software is available for download on both PC and Mac from the 3DMakerPro website. Thanks to its AI-tracking algorithms, the Moose prevents frame loss during the scan, ensuring highly accurate results with excellent resolution. Objects between 15-1,500mm will be captured with ease, which is perfect for small and medium object workflows. Larger objects can be captured, but need to be made up of a collection of smaller scans that are merged in post. It’s ideal…

Price £380/$320 Company Minisforum Web www.minisforum.uk The Mac Mini, for many and especially since its recent redesign, is the perfect computer. But it has one glaring flaw: it doesn’t run Windows, and that means compatibility issues with some niche programmes. Though it doesn’t quite match the size of the Mac Mini, the Minisforum UM760 Slim has a powerful x86 processor, an AMD option with a relatively powerful iGPU, 16GB of RAM by default and 1TB of storage The real star of the show is the Ryzen 5 7640HS processor, which boasts six cores and 12 threads, as well as Radeon 760M integrated graphics. It isn’t quite enough to set the world alight, but for the price, and with 16GB of RAM included, it does make a difference. In everyday use,…

Publisher The Gnomon Workshop Price £50/$57 monthly subscription (7-day free trial available) Format Online course Length 1 hr 56 mins Web www.thegnomonworkshop.com Whether you’re a student just starting out or a seasoned professional wrapped up in deadlines, it’s easy as an artist to forget the fundamental difference between seeing, a passive activity, and looking, which is all about intentional engagement with what is being perceived. This is where a refresher course in the fundamentals of looking can be a brilliant way to engage with the world, and this Gnomon Workshop course with Jeremy Vickery does just that. This course is worth looking at for any artist, whether they use traditional media, digital painting or 3D. It covers the basics of light from a scientific perspective and how that knowledge (literally)…

One of the essential elements of visual storytelling is the colour palette, which plays a role in setting the tone, establishing or supporting themes, and directing the viewer’s attention by highlighting and de-emphasising objects depending on their importance within the frame. Going into vibrancy overdrive is the anime adaptation of Yukinobu Tatsu’s manga DAN DA DAN, now is streaming on Crunchyroll and Netflix, distributed by GKIDS, directed by Fuga Yamashiro, and animated by Science SARU. The story centres around a dare that sees a young extraterrestrial enthusiast get possessed by a yokai and lose his testicles, while his spirit-believing classmate gets abducted by sexual reproduction-obsessed aliens that inadvertently awaken her psychic abilities – and live to regret doing so. And in the middle of all this craziness is a budding…

“We have the overall colour that we’re going to use, but then we have to make adjustments to the tones,” Hashimoto explains. “We have to decide what exact shade of red, pink or grey we’re going to use. That also changes based on how it affects each character, because if you’re using the exact same tone for the entire screen, it becomes boring. “With the Turbo Granny scenes she’s red, but it’s not a bright, vivid red, it’s more of a darker, grotesque red. Then with Acrobatic Silky we went for more of a pink colour. It’s a bit brighter than some of the other yokai because you have that motherly nature of the character. But at the same time she’s still an evil spirit, so using the strong blacks…

“This piece was born during a D&D session. The dungeon master described a horrible green hag to us as we encountered the monster. I immediately knew that I had to design this lady and that nailing the personality was crucial. For a design like this, I like to lean into uncanny proportions intentionally. A slightly awkward posture, off-balance anatomy, and crooked shape design helped me craft a creature that’s both feeble and menacing. If you feel the need to turn away after coming across her in a dark forest, I’ve done my job right.” Artist PROFILE Arne Billen LOCATION: The Netherlands Arne is a freelance concept artist who has a keen interest in teaching people how to create. He loves to experiment and discover new ways to bring his worlds to…

Price £750/$800 Company Asus Web www.asus.com This is no run-of-the-mill monitor. The ProArt PA27JCV is a high-end and high-quality screen designed for those who need extra quality on a daily basis. The first words that came to mind when bringing up some apps and imagery were “snappy” and “crisp”. The display was sharp across all of the screen elements, even smaller icons, and towards the edges of the screen. The contrast of everything was much higher than we’re accustomed to. The white canvas in any paint program was almost searingly white – perhaps too white for regular use, but it’s nice to see the monitor is capable of such brightness. And at the other end of the spectrum, things got a bit too dark; it felt like the blacks and…

Price £140/$160 Company Elegoo Web https://elegoo.com RATING Resin 3D printing can produce exceptional results, albeit at the cost of messy post-processing. While you could wash and cure manually, gizmos like the Elegoo Mercury Plus V3.0 are here to help make it as mess-free as possible. The Mercury is suitable for decent-sized projects and the washing vat/basket can hold 7.5L of liquid, which equates to a usable volume of 230 x 135 x 260mm, depending on the method you use. Set up is as straightforward as you could hope. Take out the components, remove a few protective films, plug it into the power and you’re ready to go. You can use the basket to hold your print jobs, or the adjustable hangers on the top to fit your print bed and…

MattyB’s Brush Pack for Procreate: Hatch Artist MattyB Software Procreate Brushes 35 Price Donation RATING This excellent pack of 35 different hatching effects is a joy to use. With a wide range of dots, scratches and lines, these brushes are a great way to add illustrative texture to sketches. https://mattyb.gumroad.com Nikko’s Brushes Artist Nikolai Lockertsen Software Procreate Brushes 5 Price Free RATING These five brushes from digital artist Nikolai Lockertsen are potentially all the Procreate brushes that you could ever need. They have a lovely feel to them, and the BleedRand in particular can add some great effects. https://bit.ly/4gAnzKd Digital Watercolour Brush Pack Artist Adilson Farias Software Procreate Brushes 43 plus tools Price $22 RATING This set of watercolour brushes feels delightful, but more impressive are the tools such as…