Day 31: The Incredible Melting Man (1977) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2025

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2025:
The Incredible Melting Man (1977)

Well, I made it--and with plenty of time to spare!  And as is the tradition, it's myself represented at the beginning and end of each year--and this year I feel like this picture of "The Incredible Melting Man" (1977) looks.  Which is pretty much how I feel at the end of every "31 Days of HELL-O-Ween," alongside a mild sense of accomplishment of actually having finished it.  So, there's that.

I've probably mentioned it before, when I was a kid, I found a huge stack of "Monsters of Film Land" and "Starlog" magazines at a rummage sale.  One of them had "The Incredible Melting Man" on the cover and I must have pored over that cover so many times.  It was a gross-out cover and it definitely captured my attention.  As for the movie itself, it was pretty slow-moving (like The Incredible Melting Man!) and the story did sort of fall apart (like The Incredible Melting Man!), but it was good, clean fun (like The Incredible Melting Man!  Oh, wait... that's the opposite of The Incredible Melting Man...)

This was a bit of a strange year for my dumb "31 Days of HELL-O-Ween" challenge, in that I was sort of bored just painting various horror movie monsters (and assumed everyone else was bored of seeing them) and decided to mix stuff up a little bit--in some cases literally, what with all the Mash-Ups and all.  Sure, there were still a few referenced drawings here and there (particularly the Addams Family and the Horror Host series), so it wasn't a complete deviation from my normal challenge.

Last year was almost all traditional acrylic paintings on cardstock.  This year was a bit heavier on the digital side of the ledger.  Granted, the first dozen mash-ups of "The Horrors of Sesame Street" and "The Breakfast Club" were 12" x 16" on chipboard, so those really kicked my butt as far as the amount of time involved.

Maybe I'll try something different yet again next year for HELL-O-Ween.  As always, we shall see...

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STEP ONE:  Here are the quick, digital pencils in Rebelle 8 on a 2,000px x 3,000px @300dpi digital canvas with the digital Pencil Brush.

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STEP TWO:  And here is the first pass with Rebelle's Filbert Quick Oil Brush.

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STEP THREE:  And here's the finished digital painting, done with a variety of brushes, blending, and whatnot.  Also, lots of specular highlights with all the gooey stuff happening.

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Done in Rebelle 8.

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