The Old Man And Death
Why This One?
First and fivemost, to show that I can storyboard. You can find the storyboards themselves here, and a downloadable PDF of them here. With that squared away...
Due to a hybrid of my Religion and my own philosophizing, Death is a fascinating character. On the one hand, Death brings peace and relief to the dying, but on the other hand, Death brings pain to the people left behind.
Whether or not it went any further than that, many people have been brought to a point where Death stops seeming so bad, and getting to play with those kinds of themes seemed interesting to me.
Though called “the master of terrors” in some versions of this fable, I see Death as an unapologetic but sympathetic force of nature. He knows his position and the value of his actions, but is not heartless. Those who must die will, but that doesn’t prevent Death from being sympathetic toward those left behind.
Given that Death is used to convey a moral message in this fable, this outlook fits it well, as well as the slight revision I chose to include at the end.
Points Of Reference
or,
Natural References, Gen. 3
As a conscientious guy, I had to crawl around, a lot, to find points of reference that I could use without getting a justly angry letter later. (Particularly taxing, since I live in a city, and tickets out to the Greek areas where that would take place would cost a lot.) So I had to sit down and stitch together something decent...or get enough disposable income for a quick international trip, but that'll take a bit, so let's go with the first one.
Death, But Greek
During my research, I learned that "The Old Man And Death" originated in Greece, so I knew that Death had to look a bit like Hades. My first idea came from here, so I worked the scythe into the staff, and turned Grim's robe into more of an open toga type design. (He did have to visually read as Death, not Hades, after all) Still, I do like to honor the historical predecessors, so I added an ancient looking crowd, for an overall Grim-Hades fusion that I wound up very happy with.
No, Like OLD Old
When referencing ancient art, known for showing majestic powerful people doing majestic powerful things, making an old man look old was difficult. Once I leaned back toward artistic depictions of the fable itself, I was able to put him in laborer clothing, and give him a well traveled but capable look. "Frail and withered" into "capable but worn down laborer" was a bit of a divergence, but it gave me a good compromise between the two.
