tonight’s will graham painting ( spent a good 4 hours on this one… so happy to be done drawing finally and happy that it turned out so well! ) I’m very tempted to make a print or something of this one to put up in my room hehe
After over a year of working on this piece, occasionally getting burned out, and 30+ hours…I’ve finally finished my Lady Dimitrescu artwork; inspired by one of my favourite artists, Alphonse Mucha.
Here it is, the result of a labour of love:
If you’d like to see some commentary on the process of this piece, as well as WIP shots, check out under the read more!!!
So I did a version a while ago; the lineart anyway. And I gave up on it for a while before eventually returning. I redid a fair amount of the lines, particularly our vampire goddesses’ face, hair, and hat. I added more and more to it, and went through several versions before deciding on the one that would eventually become what you see today.
This is easily one of the most detailed, labour intesive pieces of art I’ve ever produced. And sure, it’s not perfect- no art is. But I am very, very proud of myself for returning to this piece and finally finishing it.
Here’s the (highly condensed) process:
You can see how much work went into this, hopefully! I haven’t gotten past the first hour of RE8 because I am a chickenshit, but I am a major Lady Dimitrescu simp (even have a 5 ft body pillow of her) and her whole aesthetic/design has gotten my attention from the moment she first showed up in the earlier RE8 teasers.
It was tough to dodge potential spoilers whilst looking for suitable references, but as you can see, I did ok and managed to find some good stuff. I wanted to stay true to the original Mucha piece that I chose, but also put as much of the gothic aesthetic and Lady Dimitrescu’s design as possible.
All in all, I think this piece was a success. I’m immensely proud of it, and I hope you all like it even slightly as much as I do. I’d normally post a colouring timelapse, but the file is too big to put on Tumblr, unfortunately.
I’m definitely going to do more Lady Dimitrescu art in the future, because whilst this was lowkey a pain in the ass to line and stuff, it was somehow alot of fun as well.
To learn a bit about my Mox V, as well as see the process behind this detailed piece, check under the ‘read more’
This V’s birth name is Valerie, the name our Fem Vs have in-game. But she takes on the name of Velour as she becomes more of her own person. Her cyberware may seem flashy, and yeah it kinda is, but it all serves a function; and she only has all these prosthetics due to a particularly dark era in her past.
Her Mom died when she was just 10 years old; a tragedy NC knows all too well- she got caught in the crossfire of a gang shootout on her way home from work at Clouds. The grief shattered V and her Father, and when the grief took away what little they had left, their Father turned to drinking; becoming more irate and abusive as time passed by. Things eventually got so bad that V ended up having to run away from home.
They lived on the streets for some time, scraping by as they tried to learn how to survive in their newfound hell. Over the years, they built up a pretty decent set of skills, but never stayed in one place for too long. When they got older, times were particularly bad money-wise; she had a few bad run-ins with some shitty people.
And as she was older, V found themselves working as a Hooker down on JigJig Street. One night, whilst having a smoke between shifts, she happened to cross paths with Evelyn Parker. The two hit it off, and she was able to get V in at Clouds. This gave V a new sense of security and belonging; there was a cluster of Clouds’ dolls that stuck together. And when more time passed, Evelyn brought up to V the idea that they could try and get in with the Mox.
V was incredibly excited for this; they saw it as further steps to gaining the family they’d lost, and finding more solid footing on the streets. A meeting was set up in Lizzie’s bar, but V never showed; on the way over, they’d been accosted by a group of Scavengers, and whilst they fought like hell, they got taken down. Evelyn knew something was up, especially when V didn’t respond to her calls. So she asked the Mox to help her look.
Trapped in the Scav den, V was subjected to torture as they stripped her for parts. She was paralysed due to the drugs they injected, but she could still feel the agony. Limbs were taken, organs removed and replaced with cheap parts to keep her breathing while they took as much as they could. Even her eyes, some facial nerves, and certain parts of her neck were taken or butchered.
It took several days for Evelyn and the Mox to get a lead on V, and when they did, they immediately went for the den, storming through and saving who they could along the way. They found V close to death. And they took her back to a safehouse. Evelyn helped get V fixed up, gaining extra help from the Mox because they had heard from her the skills that V had, and knew she’d be a good addition to the crew.
When she was finally physicallyrecovered, V dove into life with the Mox, wanting to repay them and Evelyn for everything that they’d done; turning to drink and drugs when the nightmares got bad.
And they spent time honing their skills and gaining new ones. V left Clouds when Evelyn did; the two becoming private, well known Escorts. But V also took on merc work; and steadily built a rep.
This is a basic summary of her story; I’ll be exploring it more in-detail in a fic I’m planning for her. Excited to explore where it’ll all go!
As for the art, here’s the (condensed) process behind it:
Honestly, it took forever to do this piece; chipping away at it for 3 or 4 hour long stints every few days, until I finished it after 30 hours. But I believe it was worth it; I really am happy with how it turned out.
I normally shy away from backgrounds, so it was great to deviate from my norm with this project. It was super fun actually; I love the whole neon/brightly coloured aesthetic of the Mox and their hub at Lizzie’s Bar.
And it was even more fun to draw Velour! I loved making her outfit fit with the whole Mox aesthetic, but also making it her own thing. Working on her Cyberware was challenging, but I still had fun with it.
Unfortunately the colouring Timelapse was too long for Tumblr to handle :(
Definitely expect to see more art of her in the future; this little project was very labour intensive, but it was a labour of love honestly.
