In the shadows of Venisalle

A promo piece I recently did to test out some of the background effects I wanted to use in the new Marquis books. In the original stories reprinted in the Marquis: Inferno, I used hand applied shading film that adhered directly to the original art to give the different grey tones and textures. For the new graphic novels starting with The Marquis and the Midwife, I'm using more digital greys for the finished page that lets me play around with more depth of field.

Below the main image: A look at the process from start to finish~ I pencil loose (far left) and block in the Marquis figure and main buildings before adding all the details to the architecture during the inks. I knew I was going to fade out the background, so I added a lot of line work to the buildings and kept the Marquis as a simple shape to frame the center image. After adding the greys and different effects to the image, drawing in the falling snow is the last part of the job!