Be'lakor, the Dark Master

A bit of a bigger project than usual this time - here's my attempt at Be'lakor, the Dark Master! Don't tell them, but my players might find themselves facing this guy in my homebrew D&D campaign...

I found this one fairly challenging in places. The first difficulty was the demon's skin, being a black/charcoal sort of colour, which I usually struggle with to shade and highlight effectively. I always find its a fine line between not enough shading/highlighting to create definition, so it ends up looking flat, or too much variation which lightens the base colour too much and makes it look more grey than black. I had the same struggles this time, but I'm quite happy with the result! One good thing I tried was using a pale brown, AK's Vampiric Flesh, to highlight areas like the chest, making them more distinct without relying purely on lighter and lighter greys. I think this also helped to make it look more organic.

The other challenge was the metal - I decided to use Be'lakor to practice my NMM a bit more. Historically I've always found silver NMM easier than gold, but I had the complete opposite on this piece! The gold NMM I'm extremely happy with, I think it definitely reads as gold and I love the contrast I was able to achieve. The silver I struggled with a lot more, possibly because of the similar colour palette to the skin - I managed to improve the effect when I opted for a blue-based silver instead of the usual grey. I like it I think, just need some more practice!

One thing I unequivocally love is the sword - I'm obsessed with how the turquoise to magenta flames came out, and they really help to give Be'lakor a more supernatural appearance!