In today’s artist feature we’re talking to a very talented digital artist called Roost. Roost is an Illustrator who works on illustrations for games and movies. He’s currently based in Indonesia. Roost is also obsessed with a highly painterly style of digital work and fantasy illustration. The reason we invited him for a feature is because we wanted to know more about his recent Aether Crowns series.

Aether Crowns is a personal IP that the artist is developing. He came up with the idea while trying to figure out, what kind of artwork to make, when he first started out in the NFT space.
It is a world building exercise, where he’s not just going to release character arts, but also key illustrations, storyboards, environments and anything that helps enrich the dark fantasy world he’s building. For those who don’t know what world building means, it is a term that comes from science-fiction workshops back in the 1970’s. It refers to creating an entirely new fantasy world according to Nicole Peeler.

Roost draws the dark mythology inspirations from Dark Souls, Berserk, and other dark fantasy comics and video games that he’s been exposed to throughout his life. Most of the beings or bosses are Godly creatures, with rich concepts and backstories behind them. That is how the artist wanted to depict the “crowns” and mythology is a great fit for it.

When asked which art piece of the series has the most meaning to him, he said it has to be the first piece, Ascalon. It’s his first NFT, and the piece that inspired the whole series. He has learned so many things during the process of making and creating it. And this is what has reignited his passion for illustration.