CHESS THEMED DESIGN
This particular design was more of an Aha moment, I initially struggled to add a chess theme to the design even before my first submission, this time, I got an idea to add some perspective to the illustration and created a chessboard just below the magma, the magma also drips unto the board. The cracked chessboard and the volcanic magma around it further symbolize destruction.
Also in this version, I decided to remove the black border, I discovered that it looks cooler in thumbnails without the black border, the chiseled edge of the blade axe extrudes out of the transparent background, giving it an extra 3D effect.
HERO-CHARACTER DESIGN
In my previous submission, I talked about how the background silhouette character can be customized, so I just wanted to showcase how that would look, also, since this is a contest, I wanted to throw all my chips in and show what I can do.
The previous one had a daemon character while this one has a hero character in the background.
There were also other happy accidents as I experimented and tweaked the design, so I decided to combine all the versions I came up with in this one post instead of splitting it all around.
CHESS + CHARACTER DESIGN
One of the reasons I love vector illustrations is the fact that they have a modular design pattern, pieces can be fitted together like solving a puzzle, in this version, I decided to add all the design ideas in one illustration.
DESIGN PROCESS
This was purely made with vector illustration, all the vector elements are originally created for the contest by
So that's it... all my chips are in :-)
My previous submission can be found here