For The Tempest, we wanted Prospero to have a staff that felt magical yet derived from nature. We decided that the look wanted to be magical driftwood.

In order to achieve that, I took a store-bought wizard staff that was already evocative of a tree branch and wrapped it in fake vines. I then painted it to look pale and sun-bleached like driftwood, but then added flashes of red, blue, and green to make it feel as though it had been imbued with magic. I also painted the stone at the top of the staff blueish green to make it seem like it held the power of the sea.