Frank Stockton Art

Howdy everybody,

Here's my second cover for The Last Unicorn series being published by IDW. The second issue had a lot more to go on than the first issue, not to mention it was about more than introducing the characters, so I had a chance to put more of a narrative into it.


The crux of the story involves a traveling freak show of sorts, lead by the evil witch Mommy Fortuna and her bumbling wizard manservant, Schmendrick.

I didn't have any reference to go on for Mommy Fortuna, who likes to collect strange and exotic animals for her show. I envisioned her to be adorned with jewelry of all kinds, flowing silk and velvet. In my mind, I was thinking of a "glamorous" version of the "trash lady" from Labrynth, but I've been told by more than one person that she reminds them of the old witch from Spirited Away, who I agree she does resemble.


Anyhow, after I finished the initial sketch, I showed it to a colleague of mine, Joe Suitor, who suggested that I enlarge the Unicorn. Initially I resisted, but he was right, so I went into Photoshop to do the dirty work before taking it to inks.

Thanks for reading!

Frank

Labels: #2, Mommy Fortuna, Schmendrick, the last unicorn

Recently I signed on to doing covers for IDW's comic book adaptation of Peter S. Beagle's classic, The Last Unicorn.



After reading the book, I felt that a more classical fantasy illustration approach might be appropriate. Specifically, I started looking at the work of Edmund Dulac and Arthur Rackham, who both worked primarily in ink and watercolor. Each of them tend to have an degree of realism, while maintaining the graphic quality I strive for in my designs.





Maybe this is just in my head, but for some reason I thought it would be my job to attract boys to a book with "Unicorn" in the cover, as it seems to be a given that girls would be willing to pick it up (sexist, I know). At any rate, it lead me to try to focus on making the unicorn much less cartoony while emphasizing the terror of the world around her.



And I haven't done this since college, but I did a whole bunch of color comps trying to figure out what would look best for the final. I even did some in watercolor to see if that would give me any good ideas.



In the end, the color comps were helpful, but I didn't wind up going with any one of them specifically.


The final is going to be sold as a variant cover for the first issue of the series, due out in April of this year.

For collectors, the original drawings can be purchased here. There's also a prints section with some new additions.



Have a great week,


Frank

Labels: cover, IDW, peter s. beagle, the last unicorn