Great Grimoire is now a small team, but at the very beginning, I was all by myself. So here’s my (and now - our) story.

How did it all begin?

They say that even in the hardest situations you need to look on the bright side. That's our story. It all started with the lockdown. I feel very sorry for those who were affected by the pandemic. It had a great impact on all of us. People lost their jobs and their loved ones, many suffered severely from the disease.

Everyday news was spreading sorrow and fear. I was lucky enough to be able to continue working from home. At that time I was living in a small studio together with my sister (it was way more fun to pass the time together). Nevertheless, I was still consumed by mundanity and monotony. It turned out life in the closure was not that easy. One day was just like any other. The dynamics of my life were narrowed down to the four walls. There came apathy, insomnia, etc.

I needed to get away from all of it asap, to any given place. From those four walls, which were becoming more and narrower by the day.

This is the moment I should write that I made a few models in ZBrush, one thing led to another and it was on! Fortunately, that was not the way it went. Yes, fortunately indeed. This is the story of trial and error, which made it much more exciting for me.

First off, I tried to sculpt a cute little dragon. Baby dragon with huge kind eyes. But that didn't reflect the way I felt at the time. I was lying to myself. So I spent two weeks and got absolutely no good out of it (I kept this model as a souvenir but never showed it to anyone).

That's when I realized that I should start with characters, so I made a good-looking enchantress. That's it – I thought! It's time to create a Patreon so I can try to make up for the time spent and recover the expenses for the software I had bought. But something was wrong; she clearly lacked something: a story, a personality maybe. It would be unfair to make people pay for her. I had a feeling that I was sloppy. That's why this model is now available free of cost.

I felt that I was moving in the right direction. And the next model confirmed my guesses. That model was the plague doctor! A reference to the Middle Ages' plague. I was quickly making huge progress on this model. It was a character with a story, with personality, with emotions. I enjoyed this style of work. I felt safe, while the mysterious aura around the character kept me engaged.

Naturally, it's not very effective to launch a Patreon with just one model. That's why I started working on the rest of the characters for the Welcome pack. This is the moment I want to thank my significant other. He supported me and helped me organize everything. I would also like to thank all the artists for their feedback and their assistance in the design development. And of course, none of this would have been possible without the support from the subscribers! I am immensely thankful for your support and faith in me.

In conclusion, I will answer the most frequently asked question: how I come up with the models. It depends on the character. Some ideas have been growing in my head for a while. Some are the result of research on different subjects. Some are inspired by the folklore of different cultures, others – by the storybooks. Yes, our versions of the stories are somehow reimagined, which is probably the result of trying to understand the motives of heroes and villains. In my opinion, everything always depends on the perspective of the situation. The world is not black and white, there are no perfect heroes and no impossibly cruel villains. The truth is probably somewhere there, between the lines.