The primary villain of Von Herling Vampire Hunter is a vampire named Vlad Magnus. The name was drawn from the historical figure of Vlad the Impaler – who some of you may recognize as being influential on the character development of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Magnus is the Latin word for “great”. So a loose translation of the villain’s name is “Vlad the Great”.
Anyway, I had to develop the character some more and give him a definitive appearance on paper.
I studied reference photos of white wolves as well as actors Christopher Lee and Bela Lugosi in their roles as Dracula in their respective movies. Then I needed to think about what sort of character Vlad would be. He’s the primary villain and being a vampire, he should not be able to be defeated by any normal characters in the story. Hence, that’s why I made sure he towers over everyone else. Size is always an important matter to consider when you’re designing an antagonist (David and Goliath anyone?).
Vlad was also given a powerful stare and a very self-assured attitude. After all, he’s a vampire who is centuries old so he’s been there and done that.
This was just a first pass. It’s not perfect, but it gave me something to work with.
January 1, 2013 at 7:37 pm
[...] up with the basic concepts for Von Herling, Vampire Hunter, I worked out various sketches (some of which I did share on here). But to convey to others what the final product would look like, I worked on [...]