About Project
Working with the Bible Project was a bucket list item for me, especially when discussing dragons in the bible.
“CHAOS DRAGON explores how biblical authors use dragon imagery to describe the forces that pull creation into disorder and death.”
Really—DRAGONS in the Bible?
—Bible Project
Year
2023
Client
BibleProject
Project
CHAOS DRAGON
My Role
Visual Development
& Illustration
Writers
Jon Collins, Tim Mackie
Director
Patrick Murphy
Creative Directors
Robert Perez, Allan Rosenow
Producer
Patrick Ramos
Art Directors
Patrick Murphy, Robert Perez
Story Artists
Patrick Murphy, Robert Perez, Allan Rosenow
2D Artists
Rommel Ruiz, Amber Kenneson, Robert Perez, Alex Lay,
Laura Swalley
Animators
Brian Covalt, Christopher Vela, Patrick Murphy, Jonathan Rooney, Allan Rosenow
Title Designer
Dylan Menges
Recording Engineer
Tyler Bailey
Sound Designer
Reed Harvey
Styleframes & Development
My role was to support the Bible Project art team with visual development and illustration for this project. But I couldn’t join the fun alone, so I asked my good friend and fantastic artist, Amber Kenneson, to join us.
The art direction for Chaos Dragon builds on the visual idea that to understand chaos truly, one must first realize order. To achieve this, we used visual metaphors to identify chaos and order.
For the dragon, representing chaos, we used moving textures and distorted images to create a blurry or incomplete effect, much like in dreams where reality and imagination become hard to distinguish. Additionally, we employed a desaturated and darker color palette to convey the sense of chaos.
Our approach to the design was to fully illustrate each "chaotic" frame and then distort it, much like finishing an oil painting and purposefully brushing it off to ruin the image. This concept and process led us to an appropriate aesthetic and an interesting metaphor in the action itself.
For Jesus, we used gently curved shapes and warmer, brighter colors—partially inspired by the light in the darkness generated by bioluminescence—to create a sense of clarity and stillness. Through these visual metaphors, we aimed to convey a sense of harmony.
“And the gospel authors show Jesus confronting the dragon when he walks over the stormy sea, overcomes the tempter in the wilderness, and confronts death and sickness in others. Even when the power of the dragon is at its greatest, Jesus doesn’t back down.”
—Bible Project (Chaos Dragon)
