As I was looking at the visual style of Smith I couldn't help but think of symbols and signs used in religious or cultural contexts. When planning my interpretation I felt it would be nice to make use of this along with a theme.
The television program 'Supernatural' is an ideal source of inspiration as is is full of references to protective symbols. Also the Djinn creature (pictured top, left) has the perfect facial markings for reference. As I have taken so much influence from the one source I decided it was only right if the piece was based around the show. Therefore I added other elements such as the colt gun.
Key Elements
As this visual style has quite a lot of detail to it, this was perfect for the use of my additional design framework; planning of key elements. As seen below I dedicated colours to the different elements for clarity.
Composition
Once I was happy with the amount of detail, I changed the layer colours to grey scale and edited the composition of some areas. Fortunately the majority of elements seemed to fit well together, however I made a few adjustments, including the swirl detailing on either side at the bottom.
Colour Blocking
Even though I did not have to worry about the colour palette of this image, it had it's own challenges. Deciding which elements would be black and how the would integrate with the white elements turned out to be more of a challenge than I first thought. Further changes had to be made as I progressed to the final piece.
Progress
Using the pen tool in Photoshop I began neatening my lines and ensuring the final piece would look professional. I also used reference lines to check symmetry and layout of certain elements. This highlighted that the skull was not dead centre and allowed me to adjust things accordingly.
Final Piece
And here is the final result. If time had permitted I would have liked to have working in some
brown/gold tones, however I am pleased with the outcome given the time
is has taken to produce.
