The Art of Denis Loubet

Here’s a portrait of the late New York Times Bestselling Author – and roommate for many years – Aaron Allston that I did for a patron of mine who knew him.
I tried to do this piece in the style of artist Drew Struzan, famous for his Star Wars and Indiana Jones movie posters. As a first attempt at that style, I’ve still got a lot to learn.

In addition to Aaron, you can see Wedge Antilles who figured largely in Aaron’s popular Wraith Squadron Star Wars novels. To the right you can see my interpretation of Doc Sidhe, the main character of Aaron’s original period urban fantasy series.

Not included as elements in this picture are Aaron’s significant contributions to game design, and the massive body of work for various game companies such as Hero Games, Steve Jackson Games, Origin Systems, and many more.

Always willing to share his knowledge and expertise as game designer and author, Aaron held many successful workshops that set young designers and authors on their path. He was also generous to his fans, giving of his time and attention at conventions across the nation.

So this is a work that I should have done on my own without a commission, and I’m grateful to my patron for making it possible to do without going bankrupt in the process.

So let’s remember Aaron and the effects he’s had on popular culture over the years, as well as each of us personally.

Thanks, Aaron.

Here’s a lot of what I’ve been working on lately. It’s a portrait of Scott Jones done as a thank you from his fans for all the hard work he did on Shroud of the Avatar. This portrait was funded by a Kickstarter campaign run on Scott’s behalf to pay me for the portrait. This is an example of how Kickstarter can be used to facilitate the creation of art. Commissioning a piece of art can be crowdfunded! This kickstarter was run by the inimitable Frank Baxley.

This was ostensibly meant to be inserted into Shroud of the Avatar as an in-game asset. As a portrait that one could hang over their virtual mantle in their digital castle. But being the savvy old-timer in the art biz, I know that someone will inevitably want to print a poster of this, and so I did it at a ridiculous resolution. The image you’re looking at here is at 12% of the actual size, so you can only barely see the canvas texture.

Many of my Patrons got to enjoy the full resolution image, and so if you want to check this out – along with a lot of other work – you might consider becoming a patron. www.patreon.com/denisloubet

Collectors edition cover to Underworld Ascendant, the spiritual successor to Ultima  Underworld. Done in Corel Painter and Adobe Photoshop.

Everard

Months ago I agreed to do a picture for a family that had lost their son and decided that the thing he loved, gaming, should be his monument. So I present to you Everard the Halfling Paladin, and his trusty steed.

Here’s a few words from the family:

It was an interesting challenge interpreting Wyatt as a Halfling and I hope he’s recognizable, but it seemed a worthy endeavor and I did my best.

So here’s to Wyatt, may he live again and again in the imagination of gamers everywhere.

–Denis

What I’ve Been Up To Recently.

Click on source below to see more!

Replacing the old Virtue Collection with these new Medieval / Victorian styled ones. Get your Ultima-themed jewelry here! These things take 3 weeks to get to you, so order now!

https://www.shapeways.com/shops/alternateuniverse?section=The+Virtue+Collection&s=0

New Portrait!

This portrait was done for a friend who fiercely engaged in reverse bargaining to drive the price up to where he thought I should be setting it. What a world that has such friends in it.

As opposed to Frank Baxley’s portrait, his piece fought me every inch of the way. First, I had to work from a series of photographs that all had her smiling, and all had her wearing glasses. This meant I did not know what her face looked like in repose, nor could I tell how big her eyes actually were. (Safety tip doing portraits from photos with the subject wearing glasses: The lenses either shrink or enlarge the eyes so you can’t know how big the eyes really are.)

I quickly realized that I had had it easy with Frank’s portrait. With his I could go for rugged looks, adding years to his face with impunity. That would not work here. Also, Frank was a little…stingy in the hair department, and this subject had rather more!

I also had the same problem with having to ignore the photos when doing the sketch, and that was very hard to do. I wanted to depend on the photos so badly, because it’s so easy to do, but the many resulting sketches just didn’t look like the person I was trying to paint. As a result I had to put the photos away to do the sketch, and depend on directions from the client as to how big, and how prominent, certain features should be.

Because the subject was smiling, a somber lighting and background wouldn’t do, so I went for bright and cheerful. I solved the hair concern by embracing a highly stylized look that worked. The jewelry was fun to do, and you’ll notice the tiara bears a striking similarity to the one worn by Keeper in a Drawmycharacter piece I did for Kenneth Scott a while back!

Her outfit was entirely made up, with the only stipulation being the color of the blouse. I thought the high collar gave her an added air of elegance to mirror the simplicity of the embroidery on the neckline and shoulders.

I think the background is a successful experiment in making the high-contrast foreground pop against a deliberately blurry and low contrast suggestion of sunlight in trees.

If looking at this portrait made you smile in response, then it served its purpose.

–Denis

Achievement Unlocked! I can do portraits now.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/i-now-do-11653340