Luke 'Mr--Jack' Mancini|COP3

Since the goal of my practical element is to imitate the stylistics of the popular MMORPG games I've decided to do a little research in who creates the aesthetics of the game world or illustrations/character art. In a sense, a use of correct art style is important for this part of the project.

Luke 'Mr--Jack' Mancini is a concept artist working for Blizzard since 2010. He contributed to the series like StarCraft, World of Warcraft (trading card games) and Legacy of the Void.
I've looked into his WoW card game illustrations and tried to list all the characteristic elements that makes them easily recognizable.

 Alundra, Sin'dorei Timewalker, WoW TGC set.

• bold colors;
• impractical armour;
• spiky ears and proud posture;
• not a dynamic pose, but still showing full body;
• contrast between character and background (dark character on light bg).

Nordrassil Scout, card from the Caverns of Time WoW TCG set.

• bold use of color;
• dynamic pose;
• crazy armour design (unrealistic and impractical);
• elf race - really long, spiky ears, tall and slender figure, bow (or magic) as primary weapon.

 Alyna Sunshower, Crown of the Heavens WoW TCG set.

• dynamic pose;
• bright colours (light/flames);
• impractical rope/armour.

In Mr--Jack gallery there are many other examples that follow same pattern from the key features I've listed. Characters in WoW are usually dressed in very impractical armour/clothes and have a dynamic poses. Moreover, a pressure is put on creating contrast between figure and background (it's either dark character on the light background or other way around). Also, all characters (at least in case of Mr--Jack illustrations) are without any line art. Line sketch is used at the very beginning, but then it gets removed.I've also looked at the progress stages that Mr--Jack used when creating one of the illustrations:

In the description he mentions number of layers and rough time spent making this artwork. I find this gif very insightful, breaking creative process into little steps. As already mentioned in presentation, I've adapted most of these steps into my own work flow, so the whole process will be more fluid when creating practical element.