Creating additional work for exhibition

I’m not entirely satisfied with the amount of print work I have prepared for the end of year show. I though I’d attempt an additional illustration in the same universe, showing one of the characters fighting for their first spirit pact. My initial block in. I had a lot of fun with this. After painting the same scenes over and over for long in FMP it was refreshing to not have any restrictions on the composition. I also didn’t use any layers and built things up using a more painterly technique.

After roughly 2.5 hours I felt I was at a reasonable stopping point.

Some variations showing the mage’s counter attack. I like the idea of them both inflicting damage simultaneously, but I couldn’t find a way to make it fit the composition.  The ‘final’ painting. As with everything I plan to exhibit I’ll likely come back to this in the next few weeks to add some additional polish.