A Short Anatomy of My Star Wars Painting: Lord Vader’s Persuasion

Dave Dorman’s Star Wars Painting: Lord Vader’s Persuasion of the Outer Rim

I’d like to take a moment to clear up some misconceptions and explain my thoughts on creating my painting “Lord Vader’s Persuasion…” The main reason for creating this piece was to show Vader leading his troops into battle. I wanted to actually show him in the midst of his beloved 501st Squad, being the leader he was born to be. This was not a scene we were able to see in the films themselves, and obviously, it would be a scene taking place between Episodes 3 and 4. This art has caught the imagination of Star Wars fans around the world, and has inspired me to create other scenes capturing potential story elements that were not in the screenplays, but are part of the canon of the Star Wars history.

The two most confusing elements of Lord Vader’s Persuasion are the inclusion of the Imperial Guards (the red armored figures surrounding Vader) and the fact that Vader is rising above the squad. The Imperial Guards were introduced in Episode 6 as visual elements in the background, in scenes featuring the Emperor and Lord Vader. They are not exclusively the Emperor’s private, but the elite of the Imperial forces used to protect those of the highest power. So the Imperial Guard would certainly be on hand to protect a high value target such as Vader during an invasion operation. Vader’s loyal 501st troops form a phalanx around them, always pushing forward towards Victory!

Why is Vader above the troops? He is not on a hoverboard, nor is he standing on a trooper’s shoulders! We know from the end of Episode 3 that Anakin/Vader is fearless in carrying out the Emperor’s order. Why would Vader not be fearless in leading his Troops into battle? Like any commander worthy of his troops’ respect, he will join them in battle. And as a powerful leading figure, he will not hide behind his troops, but will be where they can see him and be inspired by him. During the course of the battle, Vader uses the FORCE to levitate himself above the fray, leading and directing his troops ever forward, knowing he will become the primary target of his opponents. He is unafraid because he uses the power of The Force for protection.

I have also taken an artistic license and compacted the field of battle so that I could show a few other elements that would be involved in this type of skirmish. The officers and scouts to the far left would not so close to the battlefield in a real situation, and the ATAT/ATSTs would not be so packed together. But the art I wanted to create would show the full impact of all elements of the Imperial Forces, so I pulled a few visual tricks out of my creative hat.

Aesthetic Placement of Elements in the Art: Speaking artistically about the art, there are reasons I put elements where they are in the art. As you can see, there is an explanation for what is the battle scene from a “warfare” point of view. But to paint what I wanted, I had to have both an “Artistic” reason and a “Realism” reason. When laying out the the art, the first thing I noticed artistically was that the piece was primarily black and white. Black and greys in the Vader figure and white and greys in the trooper armor. I found working the Imperial guard into the piece not only added a focusing element, to bring your eye towards the main element–Vader–but also added that bold stroke of color I needed. That red would eventually tie in with the red of Vader’s lightsaber and the red/oranges of the explosions in the background. With that element of red, it was no longer necessary to add another bold statement of color, because the contrast of the dark figure of Vader made him the focus against the whites and the greys of the rest of the piece.

One Last Visual Element to Note: There is one last visual element that you may not see right off, but if you look closely at the art and let your eye roam, you will probably focus on Vader first, then follow the line of his arm and hand deflecting the blasterbolt. Your eye will follow the red of the ATAT explosion and smoke back over Vader, then follow the path of his Lightsaber back down to the far left of the art, now seeing the Officers and Scouts. As your eye follows where they are looking, it catches the front-most Stormtrooper with his arm raised, pointing the troopers forward. We follow that line through the bottom of the art into the field of troopers. From here, the curve upward of the red and blue blasterbolts brings the eye back up to the exploding ATAT in the background and then right back to Vader.

There was much more that went into this piece and the contribution of the 501st Midwest Garrison in helping me shoot reference for this cannot be overstated. But this should help you understand a bit of what is going through my head when creating a piece of art.

A special thanks to Jesus Diaz of the SPLOID column for Gizmodo who wrote this piece today about my Star Wars art (including Lord Vader’s Persuasion):

Thank you, Jesus Diaz!

and to writer Marlon McDonald of MoviePilot.com who wrote this article today as well:

Thank you, Marlon McDonald!

Thanks for reading!

Six Lucky Fans Will Come to My Home, See Me Paint and 1 Will Win the Painting

Dear Friends,

It all started this past Thanksgiving. We were with our friends, and my friend’s step-dad was very excited to meet me, have me sign my Rolling Thunder: The Art of Dave Dorman book for him, and then watch me draw the remarque and just generally hang out all day and talk art and pop culture. Our friends Mary and Julie lamented that this was a rare occurrence for a fan to have personal access to me, and that got this whole crazy ball rolling. Before I knew it, my wife, Mary and Julie had a night planned out at my house, with Julie cooking a gourmet meal (she’s great), and the fans getting unprecedented access to my studio, my collections and a chance to see me painting live and in person. That’s how this whole thing developed. So, we’ve worked out the logistics, such as when it should be held (April 14th, during C2E2, altho’ not affiliated with C2E2 in any way), how to get the fans here (by limo) and what we should include. I will do a live painting demo while everyone’s here, and one of the Lucky Six will win the painting. So…here’s the eBay auction under my wife’s account, which will award one seat per week for the next 3 weeks. I will also post an auction under my account, awarding one seat per week for the next 3 weeks. We will end up with what we’re calling the “Lucky 6,” or six fans, who will get an unprecedented backstage pass to my private world and art. If any of the winners are artists, they will also get a portfolio review, critique and all of the advice they could possibly want. Also joining us will be Discovery TV’s host of GEEK LOVE, and founder of Sci-Fi Speed Dating, Ryan Glitch and his lovely fiancee’ and business partner.

I also want to let you know that ROTOFUGI, one of the hottest, hipster galleries in Chicago for the Juxtapoz/Hi-Fructose magazines and designer toy collectors crowd, has invited me to do a one-man show from April 6th – 30th. I am enormously honored. The timing on this is wonderful, because anyone rolling into town for C2E2 April 12 – 14 can easily cab it over to ROTOFUGI for my one-man show. I’ve named the show Pi Ala Mode: A Tentacley Delicious Feast with Delightful Amuse-Bouches. As you might have guessed, there will be plenty of octopi-laden art, along with a backdrop of eclectic pieces, something to delight anyone’s palate and/or palette, from my 30-year career.

I will have more fun news to post in my next blog about some really fun and creatively rewarding upcoming projects. I’m under embargo not to discuss them until the companies I’m working with do their press releases, or I’d love to be telling you already. I hope all of you Star Wars friends reading this have picked up my latest Dark Horse Comics Crimson Empire book (#5 in the series of 6).

As always, I thank you for reading and for your time and interest.

Dave.

DAVE DORMAN STAR WARS CRIMSON EMPIRE PRELIMS FOR SALE: OWN A PIECE OF POP CULTURE HISTORY

Dear Friends,

Thanks to all who attended the HorrorSociety.com-sponsored horror art show MALEFICIUM last night at Kosart Effects Studios & Gallery in Westmont, IL and hung out with my wife Denise and me. From today through mid December, you can book a viewing by appointment only, so contact J. Anthony Kosar if you want to spend quality time surrounded in rooms full of art by me, Tony Akins, Charlie Athanas Kyle Bice, Brian Busch, Melissa “MissMonster” Curphy, Samantha DeCarlo, Ray Frenden, Aron Gagliardo, Ashton Gallagher, Tom Herzberg, Doug Klauba, Kenn Kooi, J. Anthony Kosar (the Boaris Frankenswine life-sized pig he did is off the hook!) Rich Kryczka, Joseph Larkin, Joe Lester, Darick Maasen, Matthew McCarty, Menton Matthews III, Aaron Miller, Bill Reinhold, Chad Savage, Jason Seiler, Tim Shumate, Ben Templesmith, Jill Thompson and Bill Ystrom. There is SO MUCH gorgeous horror art, horror action figures and sculptures, it’s almost too much to take it all in, but all of the hipsters and cool kids are seeing it, so you should, too. There are prints for sale of the art as well and we hope you take advantage of this limited time opportunity.

I wanted to mention that the auction ends today for my Star Wars Crimson Empire pencil prelim, the artwork which is now on the cover of the Dark Horse Comics issue in your local comic book store. Here’s the link to place your bid and own a piece of pop culture history: http://bit.ly/tWZvlQ 

Dave Dorman's Star Wars Crimson Empire Cover Art Prelim, Now on eBay

My CAT WOMAN erotic girl art is also still up for sale on eBay, auction ending tonight as well – to view that, see my last blog posting or click here to place your bid! http://bit.ly/w09S8L

Today I’ll be painting all day, with the occasional break to see what you’re all up to on Facebook and Twitter, finally carving our pumpkin (we’re thinking an Angry Birds face design), and then watching “WALKING DEAD” tonight on AMC. FYI, I may be switching my personal Facebook account over to a FB Fan Page, which makes no difference to those of you connected to me, but I guess I lose a few pictures or something. No biggie. I have them all saved on my computer. It’s getting to the point where the 20 new friends per day are going to exceed my 5,000 limit for friends and once that happens, I don’t want to be hanging out on two different pages. If you want to connect with me on all of my social networks, here’s my 411:

Dave Dorman on LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/thedavedorman

Dave Dorman on FaceBook: http://fb.com/davedormanartist

Dave Dorman on Twitter: http://twitter.com/davedorman

As always, I thank you for reading, commenting and taking an interest in my work. It’s what keeps me going and keeps me painting.

Dave.

Dave Dorman New Star Wars Crimson Empire Art, Horror Art, Some Studio Pictures and Some News

Dear Friends,

First off, here’s a video of the new SPECTRUM 18 book: My art is featured at about 2:18 and 5:18 in this video: http://bit.ly/uOTP3G

Also, here’s the new-on-the-retail shelves cover I did for the first new STAR WARS CRIMSON EMPIRE comic by DARK HORSE:

STAR WARS CRIMSON EMPIRE COVER ART By DAVE DORMAN

I got a nice review from Geeks of Doom, which you can see here: http://bit.ly/rSyjuC

I hope some of you are coming out to the “MALEFICIUM” multimedia horror art show at Kosart Effects Studios & Gallery on Saturday night in Westmont, IL – a Chicago western suburb. It is on the order of more of a New York show with the caliber of talent involved, so we hope to see some of you there. I did a fun new horror piece here below, and in keeping with my sense of humor, I did a little “Rocky and Bullwinkle” thing with the title, which I am calling  “The Portrait of an Artist as a  Tortured Soul ,” or: “Cthulu! Gesundheit!”

Cthulu: Gesundheit! by Dave Dorman Oil and Acrylic on Canvas

Okay, here are some goofy pictures of a quick walk down to my “Dave Cave,” a.k.a. my studio. We have a house built into a hill, so we have a walkout basement, and I have taken the entire basement over as my studio. It’s sort of like a “garden apartment” with a lot of light coming in the windows, which are above ground. I didn’t stage any of this, just took some impromptu pictures, so forgive the mess. More pictures to come, but I really must clean some of the mess before I go posting them on the web.

Here’s what you see when you come down the basement stairs. My wife and I are big fans of BBC comedy League of Gentlemen, hence the Royston Vasey signage. At the foot of the stairs is a piece that brings me a lot of joy, a Star Wars painting by my friend Christopher Moeller. On the right you’ll see the hint of my Rocketeer cut-out, which was a character created by a dear friend, the late, great artist Dave Stevens.

Entrance to the Dave Cave...Beware!

When you get to the bottom of the stairs, here’s what you’ll see – my treasured autographs from 501st Members from around the world that I gathered during Star Wars Celebration shows. It brings me a lot of joy to see these every day.

You Are Now in the Dave Cave...

Another Viewpoint of the Entrance to the Dave Cave

My father-in-law built me all of these wonderful built-in shelves and I really use them. You’ll see there’s a “Dog Fight” game on my shelf. My brother Jeff and I played this game as kids. We were never allowed to keep our toys as we were military brats, always moving from base to base and having to give up all of our toys. I saw this one day on eBay and I HAD. TO. HAVE. IT. Now I’m addicted to toys, and intent on keeping every toy I have. Sometimes I share with my son, but not always.

Here are some paintings you may recognize to the right wall walking toward my great room of the Dave Cave. The cleavage painting in latex on the right is for sale. Make me an offer.

Right Hallway of the Dave Cave, Leading Into the Great Room

Here is the wall to the left, walking down that same hallway.

Crimson Empire Cover Art Rests on the Left-Side Hallway Wall

Dave Dorman Interview with Sandtroopers.com at Star Wars Fan Days

Dear Friends,

My good friend Chris Spice runs Sandtroopers.com and he was kind enough to interview me this past weekend at Star Wars Fan Days in Dallas and then go through some of my art. The only correction is he mentions my site at the end, which is actually DaveDorman.com, not RollingThunder.com. Without further adieu, here’s that interview. I hope you enjoy it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1AyVuPt2mQ

SPOILER ALERT: I’m Finalizing Details on the Dave Dorman Exclusive New Online Art School

I hope to have more news to share shortly about my new Dave Dorman Exclusive – a new Online Art School  in six week segments for a small group of serious, dedicated art pros.  I’m planning to teach artists how to improve their composition style, how to art direct, how to improve their pencil illustrations, oil and acrylic painting skills and “real world” art skills you won’t learn in a “traditional” art school, and much more. Every week, I will do a live demo and issue my students an assignment; each student will get a live critique of their assignment via LiveMeeting or Skype. There’s much, much more to the school, but these are the highlights.

If you are an ART GALLERY, ART MAGAZINE, or ART SUPPLIES RETAILER or MFR., please contact denise@writebrainmedia.com about the few sponsorship opportunities we still have open.

For those of you FRINGE fans (like me), it took me a minute to figure it out, but Broyles is still alive on the “other side” because Peter didn’t exist to be in the situation that killed Broyles. I hope that helps anyone else who was temporarily befuddled. The storyline is excellent but for one flaw – without Peter, I don’t believe his father would have been motivated to leave the insane asylum with Olivia. Peter was the big motivator. I’m interested to hear your ideas, so please feel welcome to join the discussion.

As always, I thank you for reading. I’m an “open networker” on LinkedIn – http://www.linkedin.com/in/thedavedorman and I’m on Facebook.com/davedormanartist and @DaveDorman on Twitter and #DaveDorman is my hashtag. You are very welcome to join me wherever I am.

Dave

Dave Dorman Upcoming Convention Appearances & Autograph Signings

Dear Friends,

Here’s a quick look at my upcoming appearances for the next couple of months. I am embedding links to the shows for your convenience.

AUGUST:

8/12 – 8/13 —Wizard World – Chicago/Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont

SEPTEMBER:

9/24-9/25–Detroit Fan Fare

OCTOBER:

10/8 – 10/9–Star Wars Fan Days in Dallas

10/14 – 10/16 — SteamCon in Seattle

A SPECIAL THANKS:

I want to thank everyone who came by to see me at my San Diego Comic-Con Booth 4500 this year! A special thanks to our friends the Watson family from Batavia, IL for joining us this year, to the Lindgren family in Rancho Santa Fe and the Crane family in Riverside for showing us Canyon Lake…!

Dave Dorman at SDCC 2011: Photo by Debbie M. Lindgren

 

NEWS:

I discovered I’m in Morgan Spurlock’s new book Comic-Con IV: A Fan’s Hope (see me featured on Page 99) and I hope to make it into his movie, but we’ll see. They filmed my interview last year. My art is featured in Andrew Gaska’s new Conspiracy of the Planet of the Apes by Archaia and I have a couple of other book surprises coming up that I cannot share yet…

This year Steven Spielberg was given an Inkpot Award at San Diego Comic-Con, so now he’s in an elite group with me (ha!). I won my last year, so this may be the one and only time in my life that I ever one-up Steven Spielberg.

My friend Andrew Charon of Acme Digital Laboratories in Minneapolis, a Webby  award-winning developer who did YearbookYourself.com and who just launched the really cool Jewish Sudoku game Judoku as an Apple iPad app, is developing my iPhone/iPad app of art staring in August, so be watching for that in the coming months. Andrew is a longtime cohort of my wife’s and together they have done some really cool and award-winning multimedia and video projects.

I have a few of my first-ever sketchbooks remaining from my one-and-only 250 print run, so if anyone wants to place an order, they are $10 plus $5 shipping and you can email me at dormanart@yahoo.com or Paypal me at dormanart@yahoo.com. A special thanks to my wife and publicist Denise Dorman of WriteBrain Media, who keeps all of these plates spinning on the cue sticks.

As always, I thank you for your support and interest in my work. Lots of fun and exciting stuff coming up this fall…stay tuned!

Dave.

Me on SOCIAL MEDIA:

Follow me on Twitter: @DaveDorman and my hashtag is #DaveDorman

Follow me on Facebook.com/DaveDorman

Connect with me on Linkedin.com/in/thedavedorman

To schedule me for media interviews, please contact my wife and publicist denise@writebrainmedia.com | facebook.com/writebrainmedia or Twitter.com/writebrainmedia

My Thoughts on Thanksgiving Weekend

Dear Friends,

I have so much to be thankful for this year, I don’t know where to begin. I’m thankful for those closest to me–my wife, my son, my best friend Steve Smith, my friend Charlie Athanas, my in-laws who have helped me out tremendously this past year, Colin Pritchard of Rocket No. 9, Kevin Sandstrom at Blick Art Supply, the 501st, (especially Chris Spice of top-rated Star Wars site Sandtroopers.com) the great art directors and editors I’ve worked with this past year, and also for all of you who take an interest in my art and are the reason I keep doing what I do. I am thankful for my U.S. military family, for USACares.org and  for The Dennis Miller Radio Show who has been kind enough to have me on to share my projects and my military art passion project, Project 52.

I especially thank all of you who have purchased my new art career retrospective and memoir book, ROLLING THUNDER: THE ART OF DAVE DORMAN, by IDW Publishing/Desperado Publishing, either for yourselves, or for a loved one as a holiday gift. Even if the book wasn’t mine, I would enjoy 4.5 pounds of art in hardcover to peruse over my mulled cider during the holidays.

Today I wanted to share another blog with you, written by my friend and fellow 501st member David Syczylo. David is the Snowtrooper who posed for me for this year’s Star Wars Celebration painting. He did an excellent job of explaining the poses, not to mention providing us all with a brilliant display he has created of my Star Wars Celebration prints:

http://www.djsyczylo.net/chronicles/DormanHoth/DormanHoth.htm

I hope you enjoy David’s blog as much as I did about how the Star Wars Celebration piece came about. The best part of this project? I have been very fortunate to get to know David over the past 6 months and he is a special person to me and my wife. You will never meet a kinder or more giving person. He drove all of the way to my home in northern Illinois from Indianapolis just to pose for me, and refused to take even  gas money. That’s the kind of guy David is. Ask him about his film career when you meet him. He has great stories.

Thanks for reading. More to come. I just did a Captain Marvel this past weekend for the very first time in my career, but I have to check with an editor first to see when I can post it.

Be safe this holiday weekend,

Dave.

P.S. I finally got to see “Walking Dead.” I’m hooked. What do you all think of it? Any of you watching? If not, check it out – let’s compare notes. My friend and fellow judge in the December 6th Chicago 10-minute horror play international competition Death Scribe 2010, Jay Bonansinga, is writing the novelization of the series and he’s an excellent writer.