Guardian portraits were magically animated paintings that were commonly employed as traps. These realistic portraits typically depicted a distinguished humanoid figure, who's eyes gave the impression of watching and following people around. Save this quality, they were otherwise indistinguishable from ordinary paintings, unless inspected through magical detection.
While guardian portraits were made of both a painting and its frame, they were fused together by powerful magic and could not be taken apart. They used innate Spellcasting abilities to attack their foes, which varied in strength and subtlety. While the paintings themselves could not move, their painted figure could animate to perform somatic and verbal Spell Components.