The first encounter with the sandworm in Frank Herbert's Dune will give you chills. It's this gargantuan creature that ascends from the sands of the desert planet Arrakis to devour an entire spice crawler, a humongous machine in itself but proved useless against the monstrosity that is Shai-Hulud.
Reading about how Shai-Hulud was revered by the Fremen as this maker, these creatures that shape the very planet itself, I could only imagine the terror and the awe it must have been to look at this creature.
Warner Bros. Pictures & Legendary Entertainment
Fast forward to Denis Villeneuve's adaptation of Dune. I couldn't be happier at how they portrayed the Shai-Hulud - menacing, foreboding, a giant eye that struck terror as it stares back at you with its gaping maw.
Juli Kosolapova. Evan Qu.
One thing I made sure for the artwork I did, it had to look like an eye. I've always had a fascination with randomly dropping eyes into some of my works and this one wasn't any different. It had to be fearful, it had to be gigantic, it had to be huge - a cosmic horror staring down at the vastness of Arrakis.
Shai-Hulud Emerges. The sandworm should kick up a storm, a dust cloud so huge it looked like these alien thunderheads in the landscape.
Type treatment. The copy of Dune I was reading was designed by Alex Trochut - and I have always loved the type treatment he has done for it. So I wanted to both give a nod to Alex Trochut and also to the type they used for Denis Villeneuve's adaptation.
Thanks for watching!
