Sacred Circle

For my thesis I have designed a board game called Sacred Circle in which players must race around the board, defeating monsters and collecting points to be the first player to reach the center. While I am both a traditional and digital artist, this project is entirely digital, as I felt it was what best fit the simple, cartoon art style of the environment and characters I created. The inspiration for my illustrations comes from my reverence for nature as well as my love for fantasy and magic, and I am often creating woodland scenes filled with gnomes, fairies, and witches. Creating a board game allowed me to take on a new challenge as I designed and displayed these ideas in a way I never have before. Characters became physical objects with a purpose, and backgrounds became an interactable environment. Through the experience of this game I hope to inspire people to find the magic in their everyday lives and see the world as an exciting place to explore, just as the process of this thesis was an exciting exploration for me.

Bio

Hello! My name is Mae Combar and I’m a digital and traditional illustrator living in Maine. My favorite traditional mediums include colored pencils, watercolor, and gouache, which I’m always experimenting with alongside my digital art skills. Being raised by very outdoorsy parents has instilled a deep love for nature in me, and my illustrations have always primarily featured natural environments populated with whimsical fairy tale and fantasy creatures. I believe it’s important to see the world with a bit of childlike wonder, even as an adult, and my goal with my art is to convey that!