Eowyn and Nazgul - Hildebrandt brothers Tolkien calendar, my stories about illustrators:)

Let's continue going through Hildebrandt brothers Tokien calendar, and today it's the post about next illustration, Eowyn and Nazgul:

I must admit I imagine this fight completely different. Here Eowyn seems to me like a slavonian, even her armor... OK, it reminds me both, slavonian and crusaders. And the shield looks really strange. I think here I just finally see that the references were created from improvised materials, and that affected the hole artwork. The biest looks rubber, and may be it's because it was really painted from a rubber chicken (used as reference). 

So, what I want to say here - the image is not that scary and heroic as it comes to mind when you read the book. Tim Hildebrandt also said that the Nazgul was red at the beginning, but creative director said that it's a way too bright color for Sauron's acolyte. So, that's how it turned green, but as for me it didn't help. I'm still sure that this everything is because these are calendar illustrations, and create them in a way they supposed to be was just improper.

Now let's go through references. Tim Hildebrandt posed for Eowyn. And it left a mind trauma in Greg Hildebrandt Junior.

He also posed for the foreground corpse:

And my favorite part: photo reference for the Angmar acolyte and first sketchdrawing. Why the pencil drawings are always more bewitching, then the final art?:)

One more thing I finally noticed in Hildebrandt brothers art. The shading is really rude and simple. On the final art, but more complicated on the sketches. May be it's because they really suffered from the lack of time, the work had to be completed in a very short term.

Thank you for watching:)

Love, Inber