Well its day 2 and I feel like crap. Tried going to work today and couldn’t stop sweating and my throat was feeling like crap. I feel okay sitting down with a fan on and drinking fluids so I figured the least I could do was draw and be productive at something than staring at my phone like a mindless zombie.
Today’s topic was Mindless and when I see that word I think of HP Lovecraft and The Mountains of Madness. The sheer thought that something so indescribable and horrifying would cause you to go insane just gives me the chills. But it also excites me because I love crazy mind provoking horror. It just stirs my imagination to no end.
My thoughts were what could be something horrifying dealing with the mind? Being forced to remove your own brain and put it in a glass bubble of course.
With some mixed media paper, hand model and photo blue pencil and did a rough sketch of a hand holding its own brain in a blood stained glass bubble. I really loved how it turned out (I usually suck at drawing hands) but I didn’t think it was creepy enough. It needed some Lovecraft horror.
The only horror I could think of was the awesome Lovecraft inspired creature in the game Skyrim, Hermaeus Mora a Daedric Prince from the Elder Scrolls Universe who has a big terrifying eye floating in a wisp of dark mater surrounded by smaller eyes and tentacles. I loved the character as it’s neither good nor evil it just exists to acquire treasure troves of knowledge to keep in its domain. So I imagine such a mighty being could just force someone to claw out their own brain and present it to the Daedric Prince to consume its knowledge.
Once I had my rough sketch done I outlined the sketch using Faber Castel ink pens. I added some color flair with some Tom Bow markers to highlight blood dripping off the hand and the aura of mind controlling light coming from Hermaeus Mora.
I wanted to add blood stained fingerprints to the glass bubble but I didn’t like the sketched version of fingerprints I made. So I brushed some of the marker on my fingers and used my own.
The drawing looked fantastic, but I wanted to give it a very dark background hiding the horror of Hermaeus Mora where you only saw his eye and a tentacle touching the brain. I needed a real dark black and realized I could use the ink well I used yesterday to do it. I found a flat tip brush and made a dark abyss.
It turned out spectacular and it is so far my favorite drawing I’ve created this Inktober. I’m setting the bar high for myself so we’ll see if I can top this creation tomorrow. See you then for day 3 of Inktober, Bait.
Oh and wisdom of the day: Hydration is important and I am really terrible at it sometimes.