DEMONS, ZOMBIES AND THE CHILDREN YOU SHOULD NEVER HAVE TRUSTED

Modern demons. Undead pharaohs. Sabretoothed werewolves. Sinister clergy. Haunted children and shrunken heads.

The world contains no shortage of unpleasant things.

Your horror project should not either.

Brad McDevitt Stock Art – Horror Collection 7 provides 25 TIFF image files representing 23 distinct subjects, ready for use by publishers, writers, game designers and Games Masters who need strong, distinctive horror artwork without commissioning every illustration separately.

The collection ranges from undead monsters and supernatural predators to occult characters, human killers, eerie children and stranger creatures that sit somewhere between fantasy, horror and science fiction.

Most of the artwork is presented in Brad McDevitt’s bold black-and-white style, with colour and greyscale alternatives supplied for selected pieces.

The artwork may be used in personal and professional projects, subject to the terms of the attached licence.

INSIDE THE COLLECTION

The 25 supplied files depict:

• Modern Demon – colour

• Modern Demon – greyscale

• Mystic Ascension

• Mystic Redhead

• NSFW Zombie

• Redneck Zombie

• Sabretooth Werewolf

• Sexy Modern Ghost

• Shrunken Head

• Sinister Scarecrow

• Sinister Shaman

• Sinister Museum Curator

• Techno-Demon

• Touched by the Infernal

• Undead Pharaoh

• Vampiric Embrace

• Vulture Demon

• Zombie Head

• Aliens

• Axe Murderer

• Bad-Ass Priest

• Childhood Terrors

• Clergy – colour

• Creepy Kid – colour

• Creepy Kid – greyscale

That gives you demons, undead creatures, occult figures, supernatural predators, killers, sinister children and several people who should not be left unsupervised inside a museum.

DEMONS FOR EVERY OCCASION

The collection contains several different varieties of demonic or infernal imagery:

• Modern Demon

• Techno-Demon

• Vulture Demon

• Touched by the Infernal

The Modern Demon is supplied in both colour and greyscale, providing flexibility for colour publications, black-and-white books and digital layouts.

The Techno-Demon is especially useful for games that combine supernatural horror with machinery, cyberpunk, science fiction or occult technology.

It might represent:

• A demon possessing a machine

• An artificial intelligence corrupted by occult forces

• A creature summoned through experimental technology

• A cybernetic supernatural entity

• A manifestation within a virtual world

• Something created when engineers ignored the ritual warnings in the technical manual

The Vulture Demon offers a more bestial infernal creature, suitable for wastelands, battlefields, charnel sites and anywhere death has attracted something worse than ordinary scavengers.

Touched by the Infernal can illustrate corruption, transformation, possession or a character whose dealings with supernatural power have become physically apparent.

Use these pieces for traditional demonology, modern occult games, fantasy horror or campaigns where magic and technology have become unhealthily intimate.

THE UNDEAD REFUSE TO STAY ORGANISED

Horror Collection 7 includes several undead subjects, ranging from recognisable zombies to more exotic and atmospheric pieces.

These include:

• NSFW Zombie

• Redneck Zombie

• Undead Pharaoh

• Zombie Head

• Vampiric Embrace

The NSFW Zombie provides explicitly adult undead artwork for publications that do not need every corpse to preserve its modesty.

The Redneck Zombie can suit modern horror, rural apocalypse, splatter comedy or any game in which the infection has spread well beyond respectable metropolitan areas.

The Undead Pharaoh offers material for archaeological horror, pulp adventure, mummy stories, fantasy gaming and campaigns built around ancient tombs whose occupants object to being catalogued.

The Zombie Head can be used as:

• A monster illustration

• A chapter heading

• A gruesome discovery

• Evidence of an outbreak

• A severed but still active threat

• The result of a plan that was only partially successful

Vampiric Embrace provides a more intimate supernatural scene, suitable for gothic horror, vampire games, seduction, predation and the dangerous overlap between attraction and appetite.

The dead come in many forms.

Almost none of them respect personal boundaries.

WEREWOLVES, GHOSTS AND STRANGER PREDATORS

The Sabretooth Werewolf offers a distinctive variation upon the familiar shapeshifter.

It may be used as:

• An ancient werewolf bloodline

• A prehistoric shapeshifter

• A magically altered lycanthrope

• A genetic experiment

• A supernatural predator adapted to a lost world

• Something considerably worse than the creature the characters originally prepared to hunt

The Sexy Modern Ghost brings the supernatural into a contemporary setting. She might be a haunting, revenant, spectral witness or somebody whose death has not prevented her from remaining socially active.

The illustration can support:

• Urban fantasy

• Paranormal romance

• Modern gothic horror

• Supernatural investigation

• Adult horror

• Stories involving ghosts who appear almost entirely human

The precise nature of the figures remains yours to decide.

The filenames offer a starting point.

Your project supplies the history, rules and regrettable consequences.

OCCULTISTS AND SINISTER EXPERTS

Horror stories often require people who know what is happening.

Unfortunately, these people are rarely trustworthy.

The collection includes:

• Sinister Shaman

• Sinister Museum Curator

• Mystic Ascension

• Mystic Redhead

• Bad-Ass Priest

• Clergy

The Sinister Shaman can represent an occult practitioner, spiritual intermediary, cult leader or antagonist dealing with powers beyond ordinary understanding.

The Sinister Museum Curator is ready for archaeological horror, cursed collections and investigations involving artefacts that should never have been removed from their original resting places.

He might be:

• An expert in forbidden antiquities

• The keeper of a supernatural collection

• A member of an occult society

• A scholar corrupted by an artefact

• A patron who knows more than he admits

• The person responsible for opening the sealed exhibit

The Bad-Ass Priest and colour Clergy illustration provide religious figures suitable for exorcism, monster hunting, occult conspiracy and supernatural action.

They may be allies, antagonists or representatives of institutions whose intentions are less reassuring than their vestments suggest.

Mystic Ascension and Mystic Redhead provide more enigmatic material for rituals, visions, supernatural transformation or occult characters whose exact role can be adapted to the project.

Faith, scholarship and magic can all provide answers.

They can also produce significantly more complicated questions.

THE CHILDREN ARE NOT ALL RIGHT

Children have always been effective subjects for horror.

They appear vulnerable, familiar and harmless.

This provides the genre with something to corrupt.

Horror Collection 7 includes:

• Childhood Terrors

• Creepy Kid – colour

• Creepy Kid – greyscale

The Creepy Kid is supplied in both colour and greyscale, allowing the same image to suit different layouts and printing requirements.

These pieces can be used for:

• Haunted children

• Possession

• Supernatural families

• Imaginary friends that are not imaginary

• Psychic abilities

• Ghost stories

• Sinister schools

• Children who know far more than the adults

• Things pretending to be children

Childhood Terrors may illustrate nightmares, traumatic memories, supernatural persecution or the discovery that something has been watching from the corner of the bedroom.

The figures need not be villains.

They may be victims, witnesses or the only people capable of seeing the threat clearly.

That will not necessarily make them less disturbing.

HUMAN MONSTERS

Not every horror requires supernatural powers.

Somebody with an axe and sufficient determination remains perfectly capable of ruining the evening.

The Axe Murderer offers an immediate image for:

• Slasher adventures

• Serial-killer investigations

• Home-invasion horror

• Crime scenarios

• Survival games

• Human antagonists

• Characters caught in the middle of an extremely unfortunate misunderstanding involving an axe

The figure may be precisely what the filename suggests.

It might also represent a frightened survivor, executioner, woodsman or desperate character using the only available weapon.

The image establishes danger.

The writer determines where that danger comes from.

SCARECROWS, SHRUNKEN HEADS AND OTHER BAD OMENS

The Sinister Scarecrow and Shrunken Head provide classic horror imagery suited to curses, rural legends, occult collections and magical artefacts.

The Sinister Scarecrow might be:

• An animated guardian

• A vessel for a spirit

• A rural monster

• A warning placed at the edge of forbidden land

• The instrument of a witch

• An apparently ordinary object that changes position when nobody is looking

The Shrunken Head can serve as:

• An occult artefact

• A preserved oracle

• A cursed object

• Evidence found in a collection

• The focus of a ritual

• Something that begins speaking after midnight

Both pieces can be used as monsters, props, chapter illustrations or the seeds of complete adventures.

A good horror image does more than depict a threat.

It suggests the history that made the threat possible.

ALIENS IN THE HORROR COLLECTION

The Aliens illustration broadens the collection into science-fiction horror, conspiracy and extraterrestrial encounters.

The figures might represent:

• Alien visitors

• Invaders

• Experimental organisms

• Interdimensional creatures

• Mutants

• Survivors of a hidden civilisation

• Beings discovered aboard a derelict spacecraft

• The reason the government has sealed off the surrounding area

Science-fiction horror works particularly well when the creatures remain only partly understood.

Are they intelligent?

Are they hostile?

Are they individuals—or extensions of a larger organism?

Did they arrive from another planet, or have they been here all along?

The illustration gives them a face.

You decide whether the characters live long enough to understand it.

ART THAT GENERATES ADVENTURES

Useful stock art does more than fill space.

It creates questions.

What is ascending in the Mystic Ascension?

Who transformed the Modern Demon?

Why has the museum curator been collecting shrunken heads?

What created the Sabretooth Werewolf?

Who touched the character with infernal power?

Why is the pharaoh still moving?

What does the Creepy Kid see?

Who summoned the Techno-Demon?

What happened during the Vampiric Embrace?

Why does the scarecrow appear closer every morning?

Choose an illustration.

Decide what its subject wants.

Place something inconvenient in the way.

Connect the resulting trouble to the player characters.

That is often enough to begin an encounter, investigation or complete campaign.

PROFESSIONAL ART FOR INDEPENDENT CREATORS

Commissioning bespoke artwork remains the best way to obtain precisely the image a project requires.

It is also expensive.

Independent publishers must generally divide limited funds between writing, editing, layout, printing, promotion and the dangerously unconventional ambition of paying themselves.

Stock art provides a practical alternative.

This collection can help you:

• Illustrate monsters and antagonists

• Break up dense sections of text

• Establish a consistent horror atmosphere

• Complete adventures and sourcebooks

• Add impact to chapter openings

• Populate bestiaries and character sections

• Create handouts and visual clues

• Build a reusable library for future projects

• Reserve commission funds for essential bespoke pieces

• Replace the remaining boxes labelled ART GOES HERE

One strong image can transform a page.

Twenty-three distinct subjects can furnish a great many nightmares.

25 FILES, 23 DISTINCT SUBJECTS

The collection contains 25 TIFF files representing 23 distinct subjects.

Two illustrations are supplied in alternate forms:

• Modern Demon: colour and greyscale

• Creepy Kid: colour and greyscale

The remaining 21 files represent distinct illustrations covering:

• Demons

• Zombies and undead creatures

• Werecreatures

• Ghosts

• Occult characters

• Religious figures

• Human killers

• Creepy children

• Alien creatures

• Cursed objects and rural horror

This distinction means you receive 25 usable image files without falsely presenting alternate versions as completely different pieces.

READ THE LICENCE

The artwork is supplied for personal and professional use under the terms of the attached licence.

Read the licence before publication and ensure that your intended use, alterations and attribution comply with its requirements.

Some pieces may also appear in other Brad McDevitt collections where they suit more than one genre. Horror naturally overlaps with fantasy, science fiction, modern gaming and urban fantasy.

You can explore the complete Brad McDevitt Stock Art range.

The curator has opened the wrong case.

The child is speaking to somebody in the empty room.

The scarecrow has moved again.

Your manuscript still needs pictures.

Solve the problem that is least likely to bite.