Ancillary texts - the mascot

As far back as December, I was planning to feature a mascot in my artwork, following in the vein of popular metal bands such as Iron Maiden, Megadeth, and Disturbed. However, for a while I was unsure of how I would go about doing this. While most people would start gaining ideas from hand drawn efforts, I decided against doing this, as drawing is not my strong point. I initially thought of taking a photo of Dan, who appears in my music video, and manipulating and distorting the image in PhotoShop, and using that as my mascot. This was featured on my first two album cover drafts. However, those who looked at the artwork did not find my edits appealing. The potentially eye-searing red background did not help either.

I decided that I would redo my album cover completely. My initial idea was to take some more photos of Dan that were of better quality. I took a series of photos all featuring different expressions:

I felt that this photo had potential; it shows Dan with a neutral facial expression, which some metal musicians as shown on album artwork have. I would not have to manipulate the photo to the extent that his expression would become unrecognisable.

This was taken before the photo above. The idea was the same. The obvious problem, however, is that it wasn't taken against a plain background, and could therefore pose many problems whilst trying to remove it in photoshop using the Quick Selection tool.

I started asking Dan to pull exaggerated facial expressions, in order to create a better image to work with to produce a menacing looking mascot. I felt this photo had potential

Dan's facial expression here is far too child-like for metal album artwork.

I was also unsure about this photo. The tongue looks like it has been forced out; as opposed to an expression he pulled himself.

I also felt this photo was not suitable for the genre. His smile looks much more innocent than it does menacing.

Follows in the same vein as the first two photos.

I then proceeded to take one of the photos and start experimenting with it to see if I could come out with something mascot worthy.

I started off by editing out the background, allowing me to focus on just the person. I started experimenting with colour tools and filter effects until I came out with this:

The colours are inverted and have been changed to grayscale, with a red brush tool also been used, giving the image of a blood-stained x-ray. However, I ultimately decided I was not satisfied with this as a mascot, and decided I would try and put something together on my own using image creating software.

The results came out like this. I put this together using Paint; I felt it was best to start out with the basics, further manipulating the image in photoshop, the results of which we can see below

I drew around the image with the colours red, orange and yellow, which represent fire. Photoshop allowed me to manipulate this to make it look like a ring of flames, which I was pleased with. I also applied filter effects to the face alone to make it look more complex and a little less cartoon-like. This is the image I am going to use in the artwork. The name I am going to give my mascot is: The Tri-beast, due to its triangular shape and evil appearance

Here is another idea I had for the mascot briefly. I ultimately decided it was more cartoony than the first effort, though it is not all bad; I like the shape of the eyes and the fiery colour scheme.