The Wood

Illustrations inspired by Uprooted by Naomi Novik
Digital, 2019

ABout “the wood”

These images are inspired by a scene in the novel Uprooted, by Naomi Novik. In this scene, the main characters are on a quest through a malevolent forest and are attacked by its denizens.

These images demonstrate how one can take the same scene and use different lighting and colours to convey very different mood. The first image explores how the forest might look if the forest was set ablaze during combat. For it, I referred to images of flames and figures who were photographed with backlighting. In the second image, I wanted to use more blue as it is a contrasting colour palette to the yellow/orange flames, so I researched images of damp, misty day. The result is that, while both scenes are violent, the former appears more ferocious and chaotic while the latter evokes confusion and melancholy.

Thanks to Sean Lewis for his instruction and art direction on this project.