The Time Warrior

There are lots of good photos from 'The Time Warrior', particularly of Linx (they were understandably proud of their latest monster design), although surprisingly few of lead guest villain David Daker as Irongron. Thus it was that my original idea for this cover had to change slightly, but for the better in the end.

The shield background was an idea I'd had long ago, but originally it was going to be divided into four quadrants and in each would be Linx, Irongron, the Doctor and the title. I'd had that picture of the Doctor in mind since I first saw it in Adrian Rigelsford's book 'The Doctors', and finding one of Linx was easy. But the only usable image of Irongron I could find, on Tragical History Tour (thank you, again), was cut off mid-chest and would have needed a hell of a lot of extra adding to fit my original design. Thus, with needing to place him low down on the cover and having chosen that low angle shot of Linx, a little shuffling gave a nice shift in perspective - up at Linx, on a level with the Doc and slightly down at Irongron. This new arrangement made the design on the shield less critical so I did a little research into the shapes used in medieval heraldry and produced a cross-and-chevrons design.

The shield itself and the shapes on it were created in Illustrator and each saved individually as EPSs that I could open in Photoshop and use as channels. Some metal textures gave me the basis for the shield and the chips and knocks in the paint to give it a used-in-battle feel. Click here to see the clean image. Once this was composed with the three characters, the piece felt a little empty in the upper-right, even with the title in place, so I added the sword.

The cover was finished and I was happy with it, but because the arrangement wasn't my original one, I decided I had to try out my first idea to satisfy myself I'd been right to change it. Click here for the 'quadrant' version, which I hope you'll agree isn't as effective as it loses that line of perspective and feels a little empty in the centre.

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