Spring Deity - Progress (Patreon)

I wanted to share a bit more of the progress and details of this piece, because it has been on my mind a lot.
First, spring deity is not the real title of it. I struggle with titles a lot but I need something to use as post title so here it is. These flowers aren't really all spring flowers either so it isn't even an accurate title...

You probably still remember how the sketch looks but i wanted to add it because I actually did make some changes. Firstly, I only planned it in a square format. I wanted it to be a quick drawing in the style of my Huevember drawings. Outlines, no shading, simple color scheme and square format. Guess that did not work out.
In the end I decided against a square format because i have a lot of artworks in that style and it is really hard to get square prints. I would rework my Delilah illustration as well but there are too many textures that I can't get to work. It would take a lot of time to rework to change the format.

After changing the format I found out that it was lacking something, the hand just gripping the fabric was not interesting enough. The symbolism of the piece evolved together with the current situation. I made the sketch around the 18th of march, where the general situation got more serious. Later on I added most of the details, like the snake as a symbol of rebirth in a golden goblet, the skull tattoo etched into the shoulder like a memento mori. Honestly, I think I'll have to spend a lot more time with this piece to be completely sure what it means to me. But that is fine, it is nice to watch this thing grow.

I finished the outlines some time last week, at one point I thought I might've overdone it, but I feel like black outlines easily give off that vibe. So when the outlines of the scales are colored, as well as a lot of the flower details, it won't look as harsh anymore.

So the third pic looks super messy, but it is something that I recently started to do, a color sketch. To put my work flow into perspective, when i start a sketch i don't think aout the colors of it. Maybe in 5% of the drawings I actually have an idea what I want it to look like with colors, but this piece for example started out because i liked the shape of the neck. The pose looked interesting (even though I use it a lot) and then i added some details. I started thinking about the colors of it last week, when I was on the finish line for the outlines. This is probably one of the reasons why I struggle with color a lot, because it is a major part of a piece but I don't think of it until I'm practically already coloring it. So another artist gave me the advice to do a color sketch, just a layer where I block in basic colors to put them in perspective, and that actually helped a lot. I don't really try to keep to the outlines or anything in that layer, I just lay down colors and play around with how they look next to each other. For this piece I wanted him to look a bit more neutral, no super saturated colors, inspired by some greek statues. Only his eyes and the flowers get actual saturated colors. I have no idea if it will work out like this in the end but for now I like it a lot.

So the last pic is where I'm at right now. Usually I make a layer for each item on the picture, so I have a layer for the cloth, the skin, the goblet, the snake and each different flower. It makes rendering easier when I don't have to think of staying inside the lines. This is also an annoying process because after a month of working on this it is hard to say which leaf belongs to which plant in the denser parts of the flower crown. A lot of zooming in and out and trying to see what past me was meaning with some of the lines, haha.

I am excited to work on this some more. I hope you enjoyed reading a bit about my process, it was a lengthy post. 

<3 Sarah