Look into the very eye of the creative storm with a behind-the-scenes recording of the animation process. Over 2 hours of work packed in under 4 minutes for your convenience and watching pleasure.
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Part I - Making-of: the Good Queen

It helps if you know where to look. In the case of the Queen - and TSIOQUE in general - I knew I wanted the look to stay as close to the roots as possible, understood as both the early medieval period and the gothic romanticism of the brothers Grimm fairytales. I tried my best to steer clear of modern influences in the genre, especially popular fantasy with its ridiculous, detached-from-reality designs, especially when you’re trying to design for girls/women. Sure, bikini armor’s great, but not in my project.

So off we go to drawing a gazillion sketches.

Now that we think we’re on to something, we move further.

Speaking of armor, we do also need the Queen in battle garment as she leaves to fight the Phoenix.

So we draw, and draw, and draw.

Needless to say it doesn’t always work.

Here’s the Queen as the servant of Sauron, for example.

But eventually we’re getting there.

Part II - Soldiers of EVIL

World conquer is no small feat, which can’t be done solo. It requires a vast, powerful army.

With the little time he had, one could think the Wizard was forced to make some compromises in terms of quantity over quality, but it’s a deceiving impression - each imp is little pure condensed evil, unpredictable and dangerous.

The imps come in all shapes and sizes.

Part III - Creatures of TSIOQUE
Ever since the Evil Wizard put a spell on the castle, animals, beasts, demons and monsters live in uneasy coexistence with each other within the castle’s stone walls.

Spider

The Spider is just a fluffy arachnid trying to survive deep in the damp castle dungeons. He likes to be left alone, but he’s a kind and patient spider and doesn’t like hurting little girls just for being curious. When he sees the little princess in danger, however, it may be that he’ll become one of your first friends in this perilous journey.

Cat

Like every cat, Cat walks his own paths. Like every cat, it’s unsure whether he belongs to this world or he crawled from the depths of Hell during a dimensional rift caused by an evil spell.

The Cat doesn’t care for a lot of things. He chooses his own company, and is very picky at that. You have to really deserve his attention.
However, if you happen to find a way to somehow befriend him, he can become your most loyal companion.

…well, for a cat.

Kraken

One thing that we know is that the Kraken is certainly not from this world. The rest is a mystery - we don’t know his real size or shape, and his presence is only manifested by low humming sounds and huge tentacles rising from dark openings in the floor.
As a tentacle monster, he tends to be short-tempered and unproportionally affectionate, but unlike his colleagues from Japan, he’s able to show his affection by simply being nice.

At least to those who treat him right.

Having a huge powerful monster for a friend has many benefits - he can care for you, protect you from threats, but he can also take it too far and be overprotective and patronizing at times.

Queen Duck

Queen Duck is one mean duck.

An ancient guardian of an old treasure hidden deep within the castle, she mans (ducks?) her post for a long time, and centuries of solitude have left a mark on her psyche.
She’s cold, bitter and narcissistic, it’s very unlikely you’ll become friends.

War Zebra

Given as a present to princess Tsioque when she was just an infant, the little zebra to play with grew, grew.. really grew… to eventually become one of the biggest and toughest war horses in the royal stables.

When the Wizard staged his coup, he ordered to put the Zebra in chains until he finds a way to submit it to his will.

But we won’t let that happen, will we?