Thrift Store Painting: A Dungeons and Dragons Edition

I recently became a member of CLAW (the Cartoonist's League of Absurd Washingtonians), a fun group of eccentric people dedicated to the form of sequential art in all of its many manifestations. 

One of the fun things we get to do as CLAW members is create art and show it.  An ongoing project for members is to take a thrift store painting and transform it in some way. 

I chose this barren, and let's face it, pretty poorly painted desert scape and decided it needed a monster thrown right into the middle of it!

I've been playing a lot of Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder lately and had my mind on a hydra or dragon at first but settled upon the baddy of baddies, who can zap you with the rays of his eyes: a beholder.  These floating nightmares are nothing you want to meet in a dungeon, but I figured he'd look right at ease in my desert.  I made several preliminary sketches before settling on my rendition.

In addition to the Beholder, I knew I couldn't keep the horrible water reflections.  But once you touch one thing in the background, pretty soon you are touching EVERYTHING in the background.  So I was quickly adding highlights and shadows to the mesas as well. 

Now this painting is going to be delivered to Tacoma Games for display.  If it sells, funds will go towards our CLAW scholarship fund!