Killer in Love

Key's music style and concept changes with every album release and he's actively involved in the storytelling process of his music videos which I find really inspiring. Every concept is vastly different from the last and the styling, story, colors, and lyrics make you pause and think. I wanted to focus on his song "Killer" because I thought his lyrics seemed to symbolize something deeper. He says that he's a killer repetitively which implies that he had a major role in a painful breakup where he ended the relationship causing heartbreak, emotional damage, guilt, and now lingering feelings for that person. Although he's not a physical killer, his various dark usage of words (i.e. in darkness, like a ghost, I'm the killer, pull the trigger, the heart that I shattered, like a thriller, the ashes of dead emotions all come back to life) makes it seem like he's someone cruel, a killer who is trying to keep "the ashes of dead emotions" dead, but he's tormenting himself because they "keep [coming] back to life." As a result, I thought a grim reaper embodied the message of death, torment, and having lingering emotions that didn't seem possible for coming back to life. I was inspired to do a retro look for the illustration as the song style and colors had a lot of retro influences.

I worked both traditionally and digitally.
The ideation phase involved:
-paper/sketchbook
-pen or pencil
-sticky notes
After coming up with the idea, I brought my rough thumbnail sketch image into Photoshop and used paper textures and brush packs from True Grit Texture Supply to color the piece digitally. The final drawing was done using a Wacom tablet.

I began with a big list of artists I love and decided to shorten it by picking a couple of my favorite songs by them and writing down the lyrics that were the most captivating to me. That way I could see which song's lyrics I wanted to work on more and if I had any ideas right off the bat. I keep this stage kind of free flow and write out any ideas that pop up. Occasionally I will do a thumbnail sketch if I want to show my idea in more detail or how the layout might look, but I want my initial stage to be fast where I'm putting out as many ideas.

I ended up choosing Key's song "Killer" and started writing and underlining areas of the song that seemed significant and could symbolize something deeper. It was a way for me to dissect down the song into words and imagery. What I noticed is that there was a repetition of darker words he used: "killer, thriller, ghost, haunting, darkness, ashes, dead emotions, cruel, shattered" (and the list goes on). Using sticky notes as kind of a mindmap, I was able to quickly come up with ideas and the imagery that could represent the breakdown of the lyrics.

I did rough thumbnail sketches of a couple different ideas I had and I ended up settling on a grim reaper in love. To me the words almost seemed like he was someone dark, dead, and no longer had any emotions since he's a killer, but no matter how cruel he was, someone was trying to bring him and any emotions that were dead (the "ashes") back to life.

Next, I made a moodboard of some colors I would like to use, possible style, along with some references to help me sketch out a more refined version of my idea.

I brought my rough thumbnail sketch into Photoshop to use as a guideline for my idea and started sketching.

After I was satisfied with my sketch, I added a paper texture from True Grit Texture Supply that would sit on top of all my layers and then changed the line art color to blue and turned down the opacity. I made another layer underneath the sketch layer and painted in the flat colors so that I can get a rough idea of what the colors are going to look like.

I made the background black and on a new layer on top of the sketch layer, I then started painting in all the initial details using the Chromograph brush set from True Grit Texture Supply.

I then added some shading into the face, hand, and more pink and blue color into the clothing to give it more dimension. Since majority of the drawing is in black, I used purples and darker blues to show shadow.

I started adding in highlights into the sword and the plants.

After doing some initial highlights on the sword, I made some additional layers and painted in even more highlights on the face, pink highlights into the fabric folds of the clothing, more shine in the blade, and added some smaller stars. By adding highlights, you get more depth by indicating where the light and shadows are and it helps make the image pop out against the dark background.

Finishing off the piece, I added some pink glow around the edges of the smoke and at the bottom of the canvas by using the Noise Shader brush by True Grit Texture Supply. By adding pink noise, it allows the smoke to look a bit hazy and glowy to express the intensity of the emotions he's experiencing.

And here is the finished piece!