Hi folks! Here's the finished painting for the 'Legends of the American Old West' Art Book I'll be contributing in, titled 'Belle Starr' (Bandit Queen); & here's the official post I made some weeks back for more details on the project. The book is basically going to be a compilation of artworks by over 30 different artists from around the globe all working under the same theme of 'Legends of the American Old West'.
As well as Mike Collins (the host & organiser of the project), there are some other amazing people featuring in this book also. Just to name a few, there are the talented Jez Tuya, Rhys Byfield, Gillian Reid, Justin Rodrigues + much more! Here's a great post over on Mike's blog showing how the book's looking so far.
Will post up a WIP breakdown over the next few days to share my thought process on working on my piece. I went in several different directions in the beginning & couldn't quite decide where to go, but thanks to the help of my friends online who threw in their thoughts & opinions, I was able to settle with something... One thing I did manage to agree with myself on was to present the piece as a movie poster for a classic Western you might have seen back in the late 40's or so... Stemming from my Vintage Movie Poster project, it was actually more of an experiment to try out a few new painting techniques & compositional style (combining studies of a little Frazetta & McGinnis)... Was definitely pleased with the results, & the response from people on the final piece was amazing (very surprising actually). I also decided to give some shout-outs in the "film credits" to some friends too =)
Hope you guys like it also!
-M-
