Rifter 57 Cover Gaze of the Makara

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Hey DA Fam,
Thought I would start this one off for the New Year. It’s the cover illustration for Palladiumbook’s quarterly publication, Rifter #57. This Rifter issue filled with a boatload of monsters for Palladium Fantasy & Beyond the Supernatural RPG lines, easily adaptable for RIFTS, can be ordered directly from Palladiumbooks at: [link]

Feature: Featured is a new Palladium Fantasy RPG monster created by Glen Evans, called a “Makara”. The Makara is a frightful monster allegedly created by an insane alchemist and summoner during ancient times. According to legend, he sought to build the ultiimate monster that no man or beast could hope to defeat. After creating half a dozen, he invited warriors from all four corners of the world and every single contender was killed. The magical beast has some wicked spells, formidable fighting prowess and a very nasty & game temperament to boot. Makara love to fight and nothing pleases these behemoths more than inflicting pain and suffering.

The Makara can be seen closing in on a female Elven Mage who is riding a stallion Unicorn.

Illustrator Remarks: I enjoyed the challenge this illustration prompted as its composition was not a typical fantasy monster. I love illustrating chimera concoctions and this one hit home for it was one of the most formidable creatures with it’s own unique signature. It wasn’t the standard dragon versus knight Fantasy illustration (nothing wrong with Dragons & knights) and for that I dove in. Rendering it with all the various textures was a challenge and I learned a lot of new techniques and harsh lessons.

See link for my lesson in going in too deep:
[link]

Process: Penciled the illustration on a Strathmore Bristol Smooth finish sheet of 14 X 17, 100 lb. Scanned it into Adobe Photoshop CS3 and utilized an Adesso Cyber Tablet M14 to complete the digital painting.

Enjoy and please comment below