If you remember when AD&D moved from 1st to 2nd edition then this is a Kickstarter for you:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/710544806/the-art-of-jeff-easley
I like Easley when he goes full lurid with his colors. and over the top with his textures. like so:
and of course, “with this ring” is just good subject matter:
BUT: Debbie downer here. his compositions always felt too… boring (very oriented to a center), and his figures kinda stiff – like the ninja on the cover of oriental adventures looks like a posed action figure.
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That’s a great way of putting it. They do look stiff, which is often in juxtaposition with the actual subject matter. Like the image of the ranger and the troll you shared, it’s partly because of the way her knees are locked and muscles flexed, almost nothing on his adventurers is slacked or at ease. The way he depicts adventurers faces is partly to blame too. They can be quite stoic.
That said, I love his use of color and the actual style and texture is very nostalgic to me. When I picture his work, I imagine it on the cover of paperbacks at a local convenience store.
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I def have a lot of nostalgia baked into looking at his art. I really like the cover of MM2 because of that. (plus I think the background forest is actually pretty well done, and the realism/solidity of his figures makes GIANTS look really… big. just like “with this ring” up above)
he would pose models in a photo studio and paint from the photographs. once you SEE that there is no going back. he didn’t photograph them in motion. just standing on blocks etc. so again, looking at “with this ring”, the ranger is just… a photograph. stiff. clearly posed. the ogre is more from the imagination, and seems in motion. in that piece it really works well. she seems strong, and stiff, and the ogre seems squirrely, squirming in pain.
to me, the realism doesn’t age that well, kinda the weakest part. SEE ALSO Larry Elmore.
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