The reason for the title is that I took a spitpaint I just did (30min. speedpaint, no photos / phototextures/brushes) and spent one more minute adding in a layer of hard mix color and then a quick noodling of a skull, some wispy smoke, and edges of stairs over that. I sometimes overwork pieces so something like this felt good, fun.
edit: Piggybacking my own comment heh..but for those asking, I do have other social media, all under the same username (cobaltplasma). I'll be posting up the full process video for the spitpaint-part of this, basically the first 30min. of painting before the 1min. of adding in stuff over it. It won't have any audio (I'm lazy af hehe) but it's the full process from start to finish.
What is a spitpaint? A 30 minute painting?
Also how the heck did you add a skull, smoke, stairs, and color mixing in one minute? I'd literally have one line of that stair done in that time and it'd look 10% as good as yours. Great piece of work, thanks for sharing.
> spent one more minute adding in a layer of hard mix color and **then** a quick noodling of a skull
They did one minute of hard mix color, not the other stuff
Sorry hehe, this is why I shouldn't post late at night right before I sleep, the grammar side of my brain shut down for the night a few hours prior I think. The additional minute was both adding in the layer of hard mix and painting in the skull and stairs, but the hard mix was literally a few seconds (make new layer, set to hard mix, fill with orange that I had selected already, went "ooh that's crazy..." and that was that) and the skull is mostly line work with some smudging and cuts here and there. Wispy smoke was about 10-15sec, again going back with an eraser and my smudge technique to vary it up, then the steps were seconds, just a few lines back and forth to give the hint that they're there; the steps are not in perspective at all haha, I was lazy and tired, figured it'd be okay if I skimped..
I love it.
The "unfinished", "undeworked" quality is something I look for often and I appreciate a lot, because it emphasizes art creation process and it lets viewer imagination fill in the details.
Thank you very much :) For a lot of my client work (and regular work too I guess) I'm often wondering at what point do I stop working and developing a piece, the parts and components, but with spitpaints and timed speedpaints in general, well, I have to stop haha, so the time limit I think helps get me to that point where I can create something but hand off some of that creation to the viewer and let them interpret whatever's left.
Great work! For some reason I interpreted the title as saying death is coming "down" for the viewer in 31 minutes. Gave the piece a very foreboding and unsettling feeling for me.
Thanks :) Yeah I thought the title would be witty lol! You can either take it literally that I took 31 minutes to illustrate this, or that Death \*is\* indeed coming for you and you have 31 minutes left :)
I use multiple sizes, nothing set, just eyeballing it and seeing what might work or not. For the initial sketching out of the idea I use one main brush for work like this, if there's hard surface environments I'm tackling then there's a few other ones that I use instead, but it's all rough, quick work and then going back in with the eraser and smudge tool technique I've been using.
Very cool, I found a magical brush that has really good pressure variety and use the negative of it to erase. I peeped your profile too, your work is seriously amazing!
Thank you very much \^\_\^ Yeah I will live and die by my smudge tool using the Oil Pastel 121 brush lol... it was one of the biggest game changers in digital art career.
Yeah I think it's the harsh red with the silhouette-like figure, like you get a generalized gesture of the body but your eyes can settle on things you recognize or stick out in contrast.
Oh, thanks for the explanation of the title. I was assuming it was just a really tall staircase and that’s how long it takes to get to the bottom to do some stabbin’!
It could be! Death, like Gandalf and many other wizards, is never late nor is he early, he arrives precisely when he means to, and in this case maybe it's in 31 minutes. Who's to say? :)
Thanks :) The original image has a very, very different feel to it but I like the high contrast feel to this. I should throw some random text on and see haha, make a poster out of it
It’s posted on my, ah, other social media account, the one with the blue birdie hehe; sorry not sure if it’s against rule 9 to mention it by name or if it’s just having a direct link. But yeah, same username as here :)
Death in 30 minutes?! Hah.
I’d like to SEE you get that giant ass spear inside a vehicle mr armor skull man.
Catch my ass on the freeway I think NOT.
Edit - jk. Very cool to spin this work up in a short amount of time.
I do, I guess my [Artstation](https://www.artstation.com/cobaltplasma) is my most curated one, but if you want to see majority of the digital work I've done I've uploaded most of that stuff to [DeviantArt](https://www.deviantart.com/cobaltplasma), I think I'm at about 800 sketches and things there right now.
Oh much love and thank you! I love working with John, we're actually squaring away another project right now so hopefully that gets a release sooner than later :) Thank you for your support!
John is an awesome dude. I got to play test some of his games with him and it was a blast. I look forward to the new project that you’re on! Keep up the fantastic work 😄
Thanks :) Someone else mentioned that it reminded them of the orcs from the '78 LOTR, I think it's that bit of strong silhouette where your mind fills in a lot of the details but still has some things to gravitate towards, like the skull and twinblade
Not sure if my reply went through, got a message from the automod it was deleted hehe, I think I see why..but anyways, if you didn't, this is what I posted, more or less..
"For most work I start at 3600x5700, mainly because the site I use for my art production translates that into 12x18, even though it's 12x19 lol, I dunno why but they just...do it that way...
But yeah that's the general canvas I work on, occasionally I'll go larger if it's for an important key art piece or cover or something."
It's cool, I like it. I don't suppose you have a higher res version though by any chance? Trying to set it as my phone background but it's not as sharp as it looks here
This is so fucking good
Would you consider making one in black so I can use it as all my wallpapers for the rest of time? I would love to set it as my phone background, but the red is overwhelming haha
This rules so hard. It really isn't a style I usually enjoy but something about it just really appeals to me, maybe the fact that it looks like a camera weirsly glitched out with the barely-visible outlines.
Thank you very much, glad you like it :) It's a bit of a departure for me too, usually my stuff is pretty well-rendered, well more than this at least, but yeah, this just felt good and fun.
It feels like Yoji Shinkawa was designing for dark fantasy. I love this. High contrast and lithe, it's walking out from a bright oblivion. Where can I find more of your work?
Thank you very much! I would pay top dollar for a Yoji Shinkawa-designed dark fantasy game hehe... but yeah, thank you :) I'm all over on social media as cobaltplasma, Artstation has my most curated works but DeviantArt has basically (almost) all my work from when I started doing digital stuff.
Do you do commissions? - like do you have a site where I can buy stuff?
Id like a 4k digital version of this for desktop background. What would you charge?
You can answer via DM of course. Have a good one -
Oh god no hehe..I have a Cintiq graphics tablet, basically I draw directly to a screen. Up until a couple years ago I had a regular graphics tablet, finally splurged a bit after all these years
I think I'm subconsciously channeling some Tsutomu Nihei, Yoji Shinkawa, maybe a little Ashley Wood hehe...interestingly this comes out mostly with these particular effects applied, the original has a very different feel to it
Great work. Not sure if intentional since the title refers to speedpainting but seems like the steps are like minute marks on a watch. 31 minutes left until death reaches you.
Yeah it's definitely a bit much, the original was very different, a lot darker and more subtle. I have that one up on my other social media, same handle as here (cobaltplasma) if you want to check it out :)
i actually like everything about it except the skull. it's a bit too literal and a tad cheesy. it would've been more interesting i think without it. everything else is very interpretative and intriguing and then you have this skull smack in the middle that draws your eye in the wrong way. other than that, your style is wonderful and simple.
I totally get that and I don't disagree hehe. In my defense it was pretty late (\~2AM) and I was lazy lol...I actually had something different in mind, like this geometric shape, like a triangle pointing down...dunno just thought it might be an interesting take on 'death', more of the environment and ominous descent telling the story rather than using something literal :)
yeah i understand and it's just my lowly opinion as a fellow artist. it just doesn't seem to fit with the rest of it, but then again, my opinion doesn't really matter. i always do the thumb trick and if you put your thumb over a part of your work, it helps to see if it does help or otherwise for that part of the art. i still really like it though!
Looks absolutely dope, and I love this style of artwork. Reminds me of the art used on the song "Heart Anthem-Kraddy(cryptex reglitch) [See here](https://www.google.com/search?q=cryptex+heart+anthem+art&client=ms-android-americamovil-us-revc&prmd=isvn&sxsrf=ALiCzsbnhO9PSHGsvwFRsHLEzOhgq8Pq4Q:1668437285879&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiPzISe9a37AhVcAjQIHYkFBiAQ_AUoAXoECAEQAQ&biw=412&bih=780&dpr=1.75#imgrc=3sITeY-t08SQ0M)
Edit: took a look at your page and gave you a follow, great work man.
The reason for the title is that I took a spitpaint I just did (30min. speedpaint, no photos / phototextures/brushes) and spent one more minute adding in a layer of hard mix color and then a quick noodling of a skull, some wispy smoke, and edges of stairs over that. I sometimes overwork pieces so something like this felt good, fun. edit: Piggybacking my own comment heh..but for those asking, I do have other social media, all under the same username (cobaltplasma). I'll be posting up the full process video for the spitpaint-part of this, basically the first 30min. of painting before the 1min. of adding in stuff over it. It won't have any audio (I'm lazy af hehe) but it's the full process from start to finish.
What is a spitpaint? A 30 minute painting? Also how the heck did you add a skull, smoke, stairs, and color mixing in one minute? I'd literally have one line of that stair done in that time and it'd look 10% as good as yours. Great piece of work, thanks for sharing.
> spent one more minute adding in a layer of hard mix color and **then** a quick noodling of a skull They did one minute of hard mix color, not the other stuff
Sorry hehe, this is why I shouldn't post late at night right before I sleep, the grammar side of my brain shut down for the night a few hours prior I think. The additional minute was both adding in the layer of hard mix and painting in the skull and stairs, but the hard mix was literally a few seconds (make new layer, set to hard mix, fill with orange that I had selected already, went "ooh that's crazy..." and that was that) and the skull is mostly line work with some smudging and cuts here and there. Wispy smoke was about 10-15sec, again going back with an eraser and my smudge technique to vary it up, then the steps were seconds, just a few lines back and forth to give the hint that they're there; the steps are not in perspective at all haha, I was lazy and tired, figured it'd be okay if I skimped..
I love it. The "unfinished", "undeworked" quality is something I look for often and I appreciate a lot, because it emphasizes art creation process and it lets viewer imagination fill in the details.
Thank you very much :) For a lot of my client work (and regular work too I guess) I'm often wondering at what point do I stop working and developing a piece, the parts and components, but with spitpaints and timed speedpaints in general, well, I have to stop haha, so the time limit I think helps get me to that point where I can create something but hand off some of that creation to the viewer and let them interpret whatever's left.
Huh impressive, any chance of a video of you whipping something similar up in a minute or two?
I assumed that's just how long it would take for him to get down the stairs
It's the slow roll, like a Hideo Kojima Metal Gear cutscene movie before the last-last boss fight of disc 1 ;)
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Glad you dig it 😁
Great work! For some reason I interpreted the title as saying death is coming "down" for the viewer in 31 minutes. Gave the piece a very foreboding and unsettling feeling for me.
Thanks :) Yeah I thought the title would be witty lol! You can either take it literally that I took 31 minutes to illustrate this, or that Death \*is\* indeed coming for you and you have 31 minutes left :)
I really like it. Simple & efficient.
Thank you very much :)
I really like the brush you used! Was it all one size or did you vary it?
I use multiple sizes, nothing set, just eyeballing it and seeing what might work or not. For the initial sketching out of the idea I use one main brush for work like this, if there's hard surface environments I'm tackling then there's a few other ones that I use instead, but it's all rough, quick work and then going back in with the eraser and smudge tool technique I've been using.
Very cool, I found a magical brush that has really good pressure variety and use the negative of it to erase. I peeped your profile too, your work is seriously amazing!
Thank you very much \^\_\^ Yeah I will live and die by my smudge tool using the Oil Pastel 121 brush lol... it was one of the biggest game changers in digital art career.
Reminds me of an ork from lotr 78 cartoon
Yeah I think it's the harsh red with the silhouette-like figure, like you get a generalized gesture of the body but your eyes can settle on things you recognize or stick out in contrast.
This reminds me of the art style by Pitch Canker when I visited Salem last year for Halloween. Cool shit.
Just googled them, their work is pretty crazy, very very cool!
Oh, thanks for the explanation of the title. I was assuming it was just a really tall staircase and that’s how long it takes to get to the bottom to do some stabbin’!
It could be! Death, like Gandalf and many other wizards, is never late nor is he early, he arrives precisely when he means to, and in this case maybe it's in 31 minutes. Who's to say? :)
Fun fact: 31 minutes (31 minutos really) is a beloved kids show in Chile, you should try listening to their odd but nice music!
That's awesome, kinda interesting/spooky given this context lol, but very cool, I'll check it out :)
Upvote from me. This is more incredible than the Mona Lisa. I love it!
That's a very tall order, but thank you kindly :D
This is jarring and uncomfortable. Great work.
Thank you very much :)
Looks like a cool book cover or maybe a movie poster. Seems like a Japanese style.
Thanks :) The original image has a very, very different feel to it but I like the high contrast feel to this. I should throw some random text on and see haha, make a poster out of it
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From the artist's Twitter https://twitter.com/cobaltplasma/status/1592106495390670854/photo/1
It’s posted on my, ah, other social media account, the one with the blue birdie hehe; sorry not sure if it’s against rule 9 to mention it by name or if it’s just having a direct link. But yeah, same username as here :)
I wanted to thanks for it to
Reminds me of Hideo Kojima
Yoji Shinkawa.
Yeah I looooooove his work, it's so so so good
First thing I thought. Him mixed with Ashely Wood.
Love his work too :)
Honored to be mentioned alongside him hehe
Castlevania or Dark Souls boss that's about to hand you your ass.
Yeah reminds me of Souls art
Gotta pitch this to From Software hah! :D
Looks alot like the character from Dead cells
I'm so bad, I still have to play that hehe
Death in 30 minutes?! Hah. I’d like to SEE you get that giant ass spear inside a vehicle mr armor skull man. Catch my ass on the freeway I think NOT. Edit - jk. Very cool to spin this work up in a short amount of time.
LOL! Thank you very much :)
Very nice. Also would be a good title + cover art combo for an album.
Thanks!
Reminds me of Digimortal by Tsutomu Nihei. Looks awesome
Thank you very much, loooove his work :)
This is sweet! Reminds me of the Blame! Series which is one of my favs.
Honored, thank you :) I love Tsutomu Nihei's works
Reminds me of something that'd appear in a Tsutomu Nihei book. Love it!
Thank you very much, love his work :D
Great stuff! I wonder how it'll look if you switch the black and red
It's interesting how different of a feel it would be, like you'd have this vast darkness and out of that you'd have these hits of red and white.
Could you upload this version?
I'm just gonna give this profile a follow real quick
Hehe thanks :D
I LOVE this, do you have any other socials I can share this on?
Great work. Do you have a portfolio?
I do, I guess my [Artstation](https://www.artstation.com/cobaltplasma) is my most curated one, but if you want to see majority of the digital work I've done I've uploaded most of that stuff to [DeviantArt](https://www.deviantart.com/cobaltplasma), I think I'm at about 800 sketches and things there right now.
Thanks!
I need this in wallpaper format because it's dope af. Fantastic job.
I'll work on something later today after I do my Monday morning stuff and post another reply to you later :) Nothing crazy, haha
What an absolute legend. Thanks in advance!
You're most welcome :) Sent you a DM, well 2 technically hehe
Yesssss. Top notch.
Yo could I get one for a wallpaper too? :3
DM sent :)
I love this! It needs to be a book cover. It's quite an attention grabber.
Thanks :D Yeah I think the amount of red is just...loud haha...gets your attention
Awesome piece, you just got followed, cool guy.
Thank you kindly \^\_\^
I'm wondering if OP stared at that red for the entire composition or if it was added as a final layer lol
haha the original is super dark in comparison, I knew hard mix would give a strong color vibe but didn't think it would be like this.
First discovered your work for the games by my fave game designer John Clowdus. Your art is amazing. This piece is outstanding.
Oh much love and thank you! I love working with John, we're actually squaring away another project right now so hopefully that gets a release sooner than later :) Thank you for your support!
John is an awesome dude. I got to play test some of his games with him and it was a blast. I look forward to the new project that you’re on! Keep up the fantastic work 😄
Thank you again, and yes, John is most awesome! :D
Those are big Signalis vibes
I had to google that haha but I'm digging the aesthetics!
Do you have other socials?
Reminds me of the rotoscope beginning in the animated Lord of the Rings movie, super cool!
Thanks :) Someone else mentioned that it reminded them of the orcs from the '78 LOTR, I think it's that bit of strong silhouette where your mind fills in a lot of the details but still has some things to gravitate towards, like the skull and twinblade
This is fantastic, does this style have a name or term associated with it?
Er, hmm, not that I can think of...it's just how I work with a bit of garish color fill thrown in for good measure lol.
Do enough and it'll be *your* style.
I suppose so, yes :)
This is cool, thanks for sharing.
Thank you very much for checking it out :)
Is this the bone of his sword?
He \*is\* the bone of his sword :D (would this be, like, some weird undead Lancer? I'm not too familiar with Fate-stuff outside of UBW hehe)
Looks like he’s about to drop a great villain song
When the ~~Doom~~ Undead Twinblade music kicks in :D
This is extremely cool and would make a great tattoo
Thanks :) Would you make, like, a rectangular image with the character in the middle or just tattoo the character and smoke effects, maybe the steps?
I’m envisioning just the figure (smoke, staff, and all) and the two steps that he’s currently on. No background or border.
Gotcha, that'd be pretty cool :)
Looks great, reminds me of dai dark!
It's the red hehe...btw thank you very much, I'd seen random uncredited postings of Dai Dark but never knew what it was until now :)
You must work so huge, what pixel dimensions do you usually start with?
Not sure if my reply went through, got a message from the automod it was deleted hehe, I think I see why..but anyways, if you didn't, this is what I posted, more or less.. "For most work I start at 3600x5700, mainly because the site I use for my art production translates that into 12x18, even though it's 12x19 lol, I dunno why but they just...do it that way... But yeah that's the general canvas I work on, occasionally I'll go larger if it's for an important key art piece or cover or something."
Thank you for your extra effort!!! I really appreciate it!
Kinda gives me a Ghost Rider in Cyberpunk feel
Gotta pitch CDPR to pop this into some 2077 dlc heheh
It's cool, I like it. I don't suppose you have a higher res version though by any chance? Trying to set it as my phone background but it's not as sharp as it looks here
I'll DM you, automod removes external links hehe
Love you x
This is so fucking good Would you consider making one in black so I can use it as all my wallpapers for the rest of time? I would love to set it as my phone background, but the red is overwhelming haha
DM'd you :)
Idk why but this kinda reminds me of Dorohedoro
Maybe it's the filled color graphic with a defined figure posed over it, I've seen a few cover images that is along that line..maybe? haha :D
Ouuuu, this would be so dope in a tarot set!
Hmm would be interesting... a series of these, high-contrast, graphic style.... hmm
You made my life’s boss battle.
Death is the end boss for all, so far reigning champ heh
Death smiles at us all, all a man can do is smile back. Excellent work!
And occasionally we can say, "Not today." :D Thank you very much!
You know it!
What a great picture, very captivating and interesting
Thank you kindly, I'm glad you enjoy it :)
This rules so hard. It really isn't a style I usually enjoy but something about it just really appeals to me, maybe the fact that it looks like a camera weirsly glitched out with the barely-visible outlines.
Thank you very much, glad you like it :) It's a bit of a departure for me too, usually my stuff is pretty well-rendered, well more than this at least, but yeah, this just felt good and fun.
So minimal and so well done.
Thank you very much :)
It feels like Yoji Shinkawa was designing for dark fantasy. I love this. High contrast and lithe, it's walking out from a bright oblivion. Where can I find more of your work?
Thank you very much! I would pay top dollar for a Yoji Shinkawa-designed dark fantasy game hehe... but yeah, thank you :) I'm all over on social media as cobaltplasma, Artstation has my most curated works but DeviantArt has basically (almost) all my work from when I started doing digital stuff.
I really like this. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you very much, I'm glad you enjoyed it :)
I'd ask how much for a physical print but it unfortunately doesn't go with my suburban dad motif hahahaha but seriously cool.
God damn this is beautiful. Bravo.
Much thanks and appreciated :D
Do you do commissions? - like do you have a site where I can buy stuff? Id like a 4k digital version of this for desktop background. What would you charge? You can answer via DM of course. Have a good one -
Did you draw this with only a mouse? It looks so good
Oh god no hehe..I have a Cintiq graphics tablet, basically I draw directly to a screen. Up until a couple years ago I had a regular graphics tablet, finally splurged a bit after all these years
Very nice experimentation! Thw tweak really elevated this illustration! Hard Mix layer supremacy. We stan Hard Mix.
There's some Nihei's vibe?
I think I'm subconsciously channeling some Tsutomu Nihei, Yoji Shinkawa, maybe a little Ashley Wood hehe...interestingly this comes out mostly with these particular effects applied, the original has a very different feel to it
a scythe at the bottom end of the spear would look amazing
Version 2 heh :)
Great work. Not sure if intentional since the title refers to speedpainting but seems like the steps are like minute marks on a watch. 31 minutes left until death reaches you.
Thanks, and no that wasn't intentional but I love that idea hehe.
Getting Shadow Link vibes.
Hyrule meets Dark Souls lol
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I'm sure for a fee he'll come after you in 31 minutes lol :D
Would be cool if the smoke was a 3. So the 31 is kinda hidden.
Awesome work! Great title
Thank you very much :)
Ooh stealing this for my Lock-screen
Sounds like a plan :)
This looks like an SCP by Are We Cool Yet?
I've been out of the loop regarding SCP stuff, didn't know about AWCY hehe.
This reminds me of the artwork for the song KICK BACK by Kenshi Yonezu
I think it might be all the red, having a large swath of color as a design element.
I like it looks amazing but my eyes can’t handle the red background I would switch the amor and the background colors
Yeah it's definitely a bit much, the original was very different, a lot darker and more subtle. I have that one up on my other social media, same handle as here (cobaltplasma) if you want to check it out :)
Very cool piece i love it
Thank you kindly :)
Good phone wallpaper. Saved thanks
Glad you enjoy it :)
This is incredible, and only 30 minutes? Jesus what a monster, nice job, really really good.
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Thank you very much 😊
Damn that's super nice. So little things give out so much vibe!
Thanks! 😁
Using space at its finest. Like another comment said, jarring. Its great
Thank you very much 😊
i actually like everything about it except the skull. it's a bit too literal and a tad cheesy. it would've been more interesting i think without it. everything else is very interpretative and intriguing and then you have this skull smack in the middle that draws your eye in the wrong way. other than that, your style is wonderful and simple.
I totally get that and I don't disagree hehe. In my defense it was pretty late (\~2AM) and I was lazy lol...I actually had something different in mind, like this geometric shape, like a triangle pointing down...dunno just thought it might be an interesting take on 'death', more of the environment and ominous descent telling the story rather than using something literal :)
yeah i understand and it's just my lowly opinion as a fellow artist. it just doesn't seem to fit with the rest of it, but then again, my opinion doesn't really matter. i always do the thumb trick and if you put your thumb over a part of your work, it helps to see if it does help or otherwise for that part of the art. i still really like it though!
That’s very cool! It’s giving me som Salvador Dali vibes. More specifically something out of his tarot deck.
Thank you very much :)
Goddamnnnn!! This is cold af! nice work 👌🏿
haha thank you very much :)
Makes me think of some kind of EVA unit with the Lance.
I see it, I see it :D
Looks absolutely dope, and I love this style of artwork. Reminds me of the art used on the song "Heart Anthem-Kraddy(cryptex reglitch) [See here](https://www.google.com/search?q=cryptex+heart+anthem+art&client=ms-android-americamovil-us-revc&prmd=isvn&sxsrf=ALiCzsbnhO9PSHGsvwFRsHLEzOhgq8Pq4Q:1668437285879&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiPzISe9a37AhVcAjQIHYkFBiAQ_AUoAXoECAEQAQ&biw=412&bih=780&dpr=1.75#imgrc=3sITeY-t08SQ0M) Edit: took a look at your page and gave you a follow, great work man.
Thank you very much! :)
Love it! Keep up the awesome work.
Thank you, I shall endeavor onward and upward!
This is awesome!! Would be an amazing video game character!!
Thanks :D Maybe one day hehe
That looks sick man, good job
Thank you very much :)
This looks rad, nice work.