Part of my inktober2016 series. See the initial Inktober 2016 post for details.

Disclaimer: Below is a description a fictional character intended to be an evil villain in a fantasy/science fiction tabletop role playing game. I do not promote the occult, magic, or violence. This is a work of fiction.

Inktasy Challenge day 5 is “Dark Knight.” I rolled dark and tattoo. Unfortunately, I didn't get either dark or tattoo, although the knight is kind of dark. It's based on the Supreme Nexus Knights NPC (from Rifts® World Book Three: England™, 91). These things are lesser life essences of a powerful alien intelligence and controlled by Mrrlyn. They're essentially a self-powered mystical suit of armor.

I've been wanting to work on hands, so I did a closeup of the guy's hands, holding a flaming sword (standard equipment for a Supreme Nexus Knight). I used Sword pose stock 30 from Random-Acts-Stock as a photo reference.

Description

A Supreme Nexus Knight stands prepared for an attack.

Critique

This picture was done to focus on drawing hands. Granted, these hands are gauntleted, but, hey, it's still tough. I don't think I did too bad. I especially goofed the gauntlet on the right hand (it sort of disappears after it passes behind the left). In adjusting the from the photo reference, I think I misplaced a few other bits, as well, as this looks more awkward than the reference. Of course, I also had to figure out how to attach the head and the armor, but that worked fairly well, too. Lots of little problems (especially with symmetry), but overall not bad.

Final word

Another one that I'm happy with. My lesson learned: photo references make things easier. I've used them for three of the four previous images (not the summoner...) and it's worked well. And it helped me, in this case, with an area I'm particularly weak in.