Seeing everyone’s work has been great inspiration. I’m starting this sketchbook to stay active and for future effects to try to share more of my progress
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CAKE EFFECT?! Tasty!!
Really happy you got inspired 
posting your own stuff helps so much with improving further and just getting to know others here!
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I finished my second portfolio piece! It’s fan art of Smolder’s Scorcher Breath ability from League of Legends, reimagined in the Battle Academia skinline.
I just wanted to share some of the art direction decisions I worked through, and the revisions/changes I made when certain parts didn’t feel right to me.
Style References
Art Direction Revisions
1. Icicle Lightning Bounces
Before
After
I thought my first attempt of my lightning bounces looked more like icicles, so I changed the head trails to be rounder and the little core explosions to be a circle rather than a spiky hit. And it also looks in line with the main explosion of the effect, not sure why I didn’t start with the circle to begin with 
2. Burn Style Difference
Even though I was satisfied with the first burn version on its own, I was still experimenting with the white core, and I found that reusing the sprite sheet I used for my projectile trail worked pretty well. Which made the overall effect feel more cohesive to me.
3. Dust Shockwave
Without Dust
With Dust
Main Reference
This one was the one I was unsure about when making the final decision. Ultimately, I decided not to include the dust shockwave in the final version. The main reason was better gameplay readability, the dust makes the circle of the AoE a little muddy and it’s clearer without it. (I’m not sure how much clearer though, I’ve been staring at this fx for so long I may be overstating the muddiness) Leona’s ultimate reads well though, even with the dust shockwave because her ult has the AoE indicator before the ability goes off, unlike Smolder’s Q ability.
The secondary reason was I thought it started to look too busy for not being an ultimate
Thanks for reading! I have more of a breakdown for all the elements I used in the effect on my artstation if you are interested
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