eternal wind

not the point jannik

EDIT: a very important update

Some progress pictures for the fanart I did for Alex burning his tongue on hot chocolate in @valaks lovely Febuwhump fic Burning Questions; I'm always a sucker for fic that fills in the gaps in canon (or pre-canon, in this case) and Valaks gives us a rare glimpse into a warm and sincere moment between Ian and Alex - even though my heart aches knowing all the things Ian is still hiding from Alex, and knowing what life has in store for Alex shortly after this...

Quick rundown of my process: 1-2. Very rough sketch just to get the gist of the pose and composition down, followed by a more refined sketch which usually includes a bit of hatching to lay down the shading. A big part of this step is looking for reference photos - this might include anything from how the hands should be posed, the folds of the hoodie, the actor's face, etc.

3-4. Probably my favourite part - laying down the colours, deciding on the light source and rough shading/highlights! I usually test out a few different colour schemes before I settle on one - in this case I knew from the start I wanted a warm palette of largely reds and browns and golds, but after laying down the colours I thought they blended too much together as they were all warm colours, so I added blue to the background and lightened the table and added cooler tones (it also helpfully served to make the mug and table similar colours so the mug no longer stuck out as being the only grey-white thing in the picture!)

5. Start of the rendering where my speed slows down dramatically. A big part of this step is introducing more hues into each major area of colour - for example Alex's red jacket picks up some of the blue from the background and I also add some deeper, more saturated reds onto the fabric. To be honest I'm very fond of this progress picture, maybe more than the final; sometimes art is also about knowing when to stop...!

6 - 7. Highlights then final finishing touches! I ended up deciding on sharper, more stylised shadows and highlights - although in the end I'm not sure I made the right decision... Other final touches I normally do are colouring the lineart so it blends in better, and sometimes I apply a blur filter to the background so the face is sharper and more in focus by comparison. I also often apply a paper-like texture to the whole image to break up that artificial looking smoothness digital art can have.

2020 yearly art summary meme