Avatar facts

Avatar: The Last Airbender — Concept Art Spam
Episodes: S3E1 — “The Awakening”

“A few months after the prolific season three writer’s retreat, I finally had some time for a few weeks of travel. I was getting back into my photography hobby, and I wanted to go somewhere that would serve as a model for designing the Fire Nation’s volcanic landscape. I ended up fulfilling a lifelong dream and visited Iceland, journeying all across the desolate highlands and verdant coastlands for ten days. The landscape was raw, rugged, and violent, with a terrible beauty that perfectly encapsulated what I had in mind for Zuko’s turbulent homeland. I shot thousands of photos and edited them down for the background designers and painters, even subjecting them to the dreaded “vacation slide show” presentation. All of these efforts helped us to give the Fire Nation a distinct geological flavor separate from every other locale we had seen in the Avatar world.

taken from the “Art of the Animated Series” pre-production artbook
images were scanned in by kartikeya200; I’m just spreading the magic around

Click here for more concept art