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This Valentine’s Day, you no longer have to imagine what the cover of The Legend of Zelda would look like if it were a trashy romance novel.
Shutterstock, the online stock-photo company, has reimagined a handful of games as if they were paperback books featuring Fabio. Shutterstock invited artist Echo Chernik to create covers for romance novels based on Super Mario Bros., Street Fighter, and more. The company gave Chernik full access to its library of stock photos, and Chernik painted over various pictures to create fictional books like Fierce Moves, a story of forbidden love between two street fighters.
The results are amazing. Check out all of the covers below, and read what Chernik has to say about her creations:
Artist Echo Chernik: “The concept for Mario was a jealous Luigi. It took a while to find the right reference — something that left a nice negative space for Luigi, while also not looking too similar to the Link and Zelda cover. The image I found of a man on his knee kissing his bride’s hand was perfect, as it reflected Mario’s short stature, while being romantic in nature. I wasn’t keen on the woman’s face for the princess, though, so I replaced it with a different photo that looked much more like a physical representation of Princess Peach.”
Chernik: “Duck Hunt took several different dogs and several ducks to get exactly what I was looking for. I also montaged a few skies together and changed the duck reference photos in the background. I used a vector scope, but modified the sight, so as to not leave crosshairs over the dog. I even knocked out the teardrop to put on the dog.”
Chernik: “Pac-Man was a challenge: How to represent flat, bright circles as a Harlequin Romance? I went for a masquerade-ball look and was able to download many beautiful ballgowns, romantic couples, and masks for reference. The window holds a clipping mask with a hedge maze masked in. It was easy to download and change to achieve exactly the right look.”
“Street Fighter was fun. I wanted something genuine. I toyed with a fight-scene romance, but finally settled on an image from a very romantic gay-marriage scene, where one man was gripping the other firmly by the lapel. I downloaded textures for the gi collars and even a hand wrap. To allude to the fight that led up to the romantic situation, I montaged in a wonderful fight scene. Once my montage was in place, I painted on top.”
Chernik: “Link and Zelda took the least amount of piecing together, as I discovered this wonderful image of two models kissing. I downloaded some elf ears to montage in as part of the reference as well as some belt buckles. Their outfits I painted on, but to make the shiny shoulder-piece that Zelda wears, I cut up the reference photo of a knight in shining armor and used that as my base. From there, I painted over the reference material on my Wacom Cintiq in Photoshop.”
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