Joe Abercrombie's The Blade itself - La voz de las espadas, spanish cover

The Blade Itself / La Voz de las Espadas

Cover artwork I made for the reedition of Joe Abercrombie’s “The First Law” trilogy in Spanish, in this case the first book The Blade Itself (La voz de las Espadas) published by Runas / Alianza Editorial.

The scene shows the moment Bayaz and Logen are under The Great Northern Library and the warrior “chooses” the sword of the Maker as his new weapon.
I chose this scene because I thought it was perfect, at least for the title in spanish. The translation is “the voice of swords” and that’s the moment when Bayaz explains some weapons have their own voice to Logen.

The scene was quite complicated because of several reasons. It’s described as a full dark place just illuminated by the torch they carry. Also, it’s absolutely full of objects: there’s no empty area without them. In terms of illustration it means: a lot of objects and a few lights to show them. In addition to this, I wanted to show the place as something historical and magical. For the first goal, I tried to show not only simple weapons but forgotten ones too, from many battles: northern helmets, different kinds of swords and even a red shield with the black hammers of Angland. Some sort of Bayaz’s souvenirs to remember his participation in all of them. For the second goal, I thought about some different ones like the sculpture carrying the sword in the bg, or a cage to let something “not to escape” from, but mainly, the light. I wasn’t sure about how to provide that touch and the AD suggested using some green touches to make reference to the “magic” aura. This allowed me to use more light for the scene, but also mix it with the warm light of the torch which was a huge challenge.

I thought about using 3 different colors for the 3 books, and thank’s to this “green touch” I knew how to start assigning them.