How League Of Legends champions are illustrated

• League of Legends is one of the world's most popular video-games.
• Illustrators create "splash art" to sell the full fantasy of the characters.

Below is a transcript of the video:

This is "Modern Icons," a series where we meet some of the artists behind the world's most iconic characters and artwork.

Chengwei Pan: Hi, everyone. My name is Chengwei Pan. I'm a principal illustrator, works at Riot Games.

Narrator: Today, Chengwei is going to show us his process for creating splash art, an illustration format that serves the full fantasy of the video-game characters in League of Legends.

Chengwei: For League of Legends, we play a 3D character in our game, right, but the problem is the character is very small in the screen. To fulfill a fantasy of how that character work mechanically in real world, we paint illustrations for those characters so a player can imagine their ultimate fantasy in the game world.

Harry Kersh: This is your canvas. This is you starting off the piece. So, I mean, what is the very first stage?

Chengwei: When I get, like, a blank canvas, what I'm trying to do is, first of all, get rid of the white, right. Like, just staring at a white, sharp kind of glowy paper is kind of like - it doesn't feel really good to me. So having, like, the top side a little bit brighter. In that case, when I draw lines, I can feel a little bit of the general tones or general mood or lightings. So, in the very beginning, instead of, like, straight going to details or colors or lightings, I'm really trying to pull out a pose or a posture to represent who this champion is, what this champion do, and what is his power source. So basically Aphelios, he has his own beliefs, and it's so deeply to a point that he can do everything for the beliefs. In that case, I'm doing kind of, like, a hand, almost like a ninja hand in the center to represent his beliefs basically, and then another hand of course, like, I want to represent his weapon hand.

Harry: We've got a pretty good body shape on Aphelios. You're starting to add a little bit more definition in terms of his hair and also some, like, very basic facial features. At what point do you kind of feel comfortable moving from the outline to the, sort of the more detailed areas of the champion?

Chengwei: I think once I'm locking down the general postures, like the size of the character, I'd like to move into a little more detail of the champion, starting with the focal-point area, such as the face, such as hands. It's kind of like finding myself some interesting points or, like, confidence to move forward. I need to see certain level of detail on the character. Because of, like - Aphelios is not, definitely not like the goofy champions or the champion or cracking out a joke. He is actually muted. He cannot speak on his own, and also he's trying to do his job only because of his belief, which we can explore a little bit in the early phase. So, in that case, I'm thinking about, he won't actually be very happy in terms of as a person. He would be very determined and also kind of, like, serious on his expression. That's what I'm trying to pull out from here in the sketch. If you want to give more stern or like a very serious expression, you can kind of, like, knock their heads down little bit. We see the foreheads a little more. In that case, also kind of by pushing down the eyebrows and the corner of the mouth, you'll have, like, a more serious expression.

Harry: Would you mind just kind of explaining the layers that you're using and sort of how many layers you end up with usually?

Chengwei: I think different artist approaching to layer differently. I remember once, like, one of my coworkers did one splash having thousands of layers. Even, like, more than 1,000 layers in it. For me, it's mostly, like, under 30, 30-ish layers. I think it's just, you can imagine it as a backup plan. When you did something, you're not 100% sure, or you did something, you wanna do something on top of it, just like the sketch I'm working on, like, I'm detailing the drawings by not ruining it at the same time.

n terms of tools for myself, I use the tablet to draw, because I feel that's the most comfortable way for myself. Most of the people in the office like to use Cintiq to draw because it's the most direct way to feel like you're drawing on the paper, drawing on the monitor, you can feel the texture, you can feel the touch. But for me, I think the reason that I like tablet is first of all, like, my hand gets sweaty sometimes, so it's really hard for me to move around on the Cintiq monitors. Secondly, I really love the feeling that I'm staring at a full screen. Getting used to the tablet for me is almost like I'm drawing directly from my brain. I'm thinking somewhere and the brush goes to the place exactly where I need it.

Harry: What's going on here? You've got the Lasso tool. What are you using this for?

Chengwei: So, after I had a sketch, I would use the Lasso tool to, what we call, like, mask character out. The reason that we do it is, like, by quickly adding this layer of blocking shapes, or values, it enabled us to quickly adjust the tone or render inside this mask only, so we don't kind of, like, go outside of the champion or outside of the character. So, color is something that I will worry about later.

Harry: So, you're about to start adding the background to the piece. What sort of tools are you using here and what effect are you going for, just from the sort of early stages of the background?

Chengwei: So, when I think about background, I'm just thinking about shapes that can support the image and also tell us a story. So usually I'm starting with a bigger brush with, like, kinda like harder edges. Like, the current brush I'm using right now is almost like a right-angle brush I'm going for. Like, I'm quickly just blocking out the composition. In terms of the shape I'm using right now, it's because of, like, Aphelios, forever, he born and lived in a region called, like, Lunari. Like, it's people that heavily believed in moon and nights. So, like, the big kind of curved, swirling shape is mimicking kind of, like, a cave with a very unique kind of moon shape.

Harry: Aphelios is an interesting champion to draw a splashboard, I guess, because of the element with his sister. So how does it make the piece different when you have to kind of account for two different figures in the same splash?

Chengwei: Adding Alune into the piece is actually quite challenging. If you only have one champion in the scene, you can have it kind of working along with the background. Two people in the scene is a different story. You need to constantly balancing out the composition to have it feel balanced. Like, right now she is like, almost like a diagonal crossing behind Aphelios. So we're not just replicating the vertical shapes. Instead we have some, like, more dynamic kind of, like, pose behind Aphelios. That's what I want. She is not the main character. I'd like to have some lighter value for her in terms of framing her face in. Also not stealing the show from Aphelios.

Harry: You then kind of bring the background layer back in. How does it affect you when you kind of see the characters against the background?

Chengwei: When I'm bringing the background in with the character, it kind of changes the game, because of, like, just with the character with background, the character will always pop. You need to actually find ways to pop the areas that you want and hide the place that you feel like it's not very important.

Harry: Here you're starting to add some lighter colors. I guess, is this to kind of reflect the light source in the piece? How do you normally decide where the light is coming from in a piece?

Chengwei: Most of the time the lighting has a purpose. Like, for example, if you're going for, like, a more dramatic type of scene, it's kind of like a big spotlight on top of the character. That creates the biggest kind of, like, light and dark shape, which will reinforce the contrast and also the striking feeling seen to the scene. So, here I think because of Aphelios is kind of like a movie character, and what he do is assassinating people, right? In real life it's not fun. It's a serious combatter. So I want to give, like, a more dramatic lighting on the top so it kind of goes well with who he is and again with what the story I wanted to show. After I had my character lit by the proper lighting, I will start to looking into the background, 'cause as you can see, just a black and white background seems a little plain.

Harry: There's a lot of blue in this piece. Why did you choose blue for Aphelios? What kind of mood does it convey?

Chengwei: I was thinking about most of the lighting scenario here would come from the moon lights, and blue replicates that the best.

Harry: Can you explain this part for us? You're kind of messing with some of the colors. What are you looking for here?

Chengwei: I was just, like, did a pass on something - we call it, like, color balance in the Photoshop. So in that case I can add a little bit warmth into the shadow area, so it's not, like, so plain, just one blue hue. That's sometimes not good for people's eye. This is a part where I blur the whole image and then later on I erase out the areas I don't want to get blurred or I want to have sharp focus on, which is on the character. Aphelios, him as a main character, is where it would be more, where the camera kind of, like, focused on. So it kind of, like, creates that illusion for the people, basically feel like they're looking at, like, movie shots.

Harry: At this point, this to me is already looking pretty much perfect, but what are you doing here? Kind of cycling through some more colors?

Chengwei: Yeah, I think it's just the last stage that I'm trying to... looking for something interesting to my eye. Like, it's almost like when you're doing the Instagram, right, like when you post Instagram photo, you're going through the filters and see which one will go along with the mood. I know it's kind of, like, very cheesy when you say that, but I think that's one trick we do, like, very often. But of course, like, I'm not, like - as you can see, I'm also toning down the opacity of that layer, because I just want to have people feel it, instead of, like, it's a very striking, strong kind of, like, Instagram kind of photo.

What I'm doing right here is to give kind of film grain into this image, so it doesn't feel, like, highly just Photoshop painted. Instead you give a sense of, it's kind of filmed. We use those kind of tricks in the end of the process just to give a better representation of the image, to give a better sense of, like, this almost feels like a cinematic or a film.

After the thumbnail stage, we enter a phase called green lights. That's where we say, OK, green light. From there on, you only need to focus on render, to make sure you get this piece as detailed as possible, as close to a cinematic or movie kind of quality as possible. In the render stage is where you start to go in detail of the facial structures, the face, the hairstyle, certain material. You want to bring out a character as believable as much as possible.

Harry: So, Chengwei, if it's all right with you, we'd like to see what you've just told us put into action, live. We're just gonna give you a quick drawing challenge. Is that cool?

Chengwei: Oh, yeah, that sounds fun.

Harry: OK. So, what we would like from you is for you to draw me in a style of a League of Legends champion. If it's all right with you, I'd like to have a sword as my weapon of choice, and I'd like to be more of a heroic character than, like, an evil character, if that's cool.

Chengwei: Ah, I mean, everybody wants that, right? [laughing]

Harry: Exactly.

Chengwei: Like, their version of a champion. I mean, I had that fantasy too. Yeah, of course. Let's do it. I think it's quite challenging, but I think I will try my best. First of all, I still am always approaching the image with the bigger picture of what the pose should be. In this case, you're a hero moment, so, like, I'd like to give a lower camera angle, which we're going to looking up at you. So you look more heroic.

Harry: Let's see if I can adjust my webcam to get underneath me.

Chengwei: [laughing] Perfect reference. It's become like a life drawing instead of, like, a design now. [laughing]

Harry: Have you ever drawn yourself in a League of Legends style?

Chengwei: No. I don't know why. Drawing myself make me feel embarrassed, so. I've drawn multiple of my friends, my wife, my family members, I draw all of them, but not really much myself.

Harry: His hair looks better than mine in real life. [laughing]

Chengwei: You got inspired by the real life, but you've got to kind of, like, elevate it a little bit, right? To give that a little more fantasy. That's my job. To makes things look good.

Harry: Have you ever drawn glasses on a champion before?

Chengwei: I do, actually. My favorite character, her name is Vayne. She is someone with cool sunglasses. Gotta give you a smirk, 'cause you're a very confident hero, right?

Harry: Do you have any advice for people who would like to get into the video-games industry?

Chengwei: I think it's just, like, applying to all different jobs, right? In order to do the job well, like, having a good understanding or a great passion on it. Start thinking about not just how fun the game is, but also think about some of the production rule. How do people create such character like this? What's the story? How do they come up with the story? Just even having those questions in your mind is a good thing in general.

Harry: Good, this is looking pretty good.

Chengwei: Thank you. Our good Insider. [laughing] You're an Insider hero.

Harry: Wow, this is incredible. [laughing]

Chengwei: Standing on a globe, as you're traveling around the world, creating videos for people around the world. I will give you my like button right here.

Harry: And there it is. That is, I mean, you've done that in less than 10 minutes, and that is incredible. It's way better than anything I would ever be able to draw. [laughing]

Chengwei: No, thank you. As my customer, are you happy? Can I get a five star? [laughing]

Harry: Absolutely, five stars. I'll leave a like on your ArtStation. [laughing]

Chengwei, thank you so much for joining us. It has been super interesting, and keep up the amazing work.

Chengwei: Thank you so much, Harry.