Speed Painting Magic Effects: Fire Magic

Concept Artist Klaus Pillon Teaches You How To Use Photobashing To Put Together A Cinematic Magic Fantasy Of A Fire Wielding Mage.

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Learn how to create a fiery fantasy scene…

In this tutorial I will show you how to create a mage performing fire magic that has a cinematic feeling using only Photoshop tools and a couple of textures. You will see how to think about a composition depending on how simple the scene is and which elements you can use to make it look interesting during the thumb nailing and sketching stage. You will see one of the methods I use to go from a black and white sketch to a fully colored image, and how to think about color schemes you can use based on the elements you have. We will also look at how and when to use photo textures and play with the different functionalities of the software, while also leaving room for you to explore your own methods.

I will talk a little about designing with abstract shapes that can create rhythm within your designs, be it for a costume or the whole composition. As the focus of this tutorial is the fire magic, we will also discuss the importance of light, how to think about it like a photographer, how it works and interacts with different materials, and finally how to use them to make an interesting design based on your lighting scheme. Finally, I will share some of the tips and tricks I use in my daily concept art production.

Line sketches:

Let’s start by doing some research. I recommend you look for a few references of dynamic poses for the mage, and also gather some ideas for putting the scene together. As the image is of a mage performing fire magic I suggest you focus on the pose of the character – try to keep it simple but dynamic. I find it helps to think of the image as a key frame from a movie to get a cinematic feel to my work.