Monday, 25 November 2019

Fan Art: Arash - Fate/Grand Order



Drawn By: WrittenDusk

After becoming enlightened to the power of Arash in Fate/Grand Order (FGO), I felt like I had to draw a fan art of him.

This was a challenge for me since I've yet to draw effects in my drawings, so I was quite nervous going into the drawing. I could have done something else, but it's Arash, so it just felt right to draw him using his Noble Phantasm, "Stella".

Seeing as how there are so many interpretations of Stella out there, I decided to take a different approach. Instead of drawing the moment he releases his arrow, I drew the moment he draws his arrow; capturing the power of the shot during it's preparation, as opposed to it's recoil.

Hopefully I did a good enough job getting the idea across.

Before this drawing I was experimenting, incorporating more realism into my style; adding in more wrinkles and skin folds where appropriate, and defining the facial contours more. So if you noticed the style difference, this is why; if not... then now you know, haha.

This came about because I've always had times where I felt my characters looked flat. I've always saw it more as a skill issue than a style issue, which is still true, but I felt like there should still be more I can do with my style. I think this fan art gives me proof of that. I'm happy enough with it right now, enough to feel comfortable about posting it, but I think there is definitely still more potential to this adjustment.

Another part of the process I want to bring attention to is the colouring. Instead of separating each section of colour into base layers and shading layers, which makes it easy to correct mistakes, I decided to do every section of colour on one layer; base colour, shading, and most challengingly the lighting as well. I'm basically mimicking analog(?) drawing at this point. The reason I chose to do this is because I knew it'd that 2-3 times longer for me to achieve the same effect other wise.

Recently I've transitioned to this way of colouring to improve my speed and expression in my colouring, but I've only done so with the base colour and shading; I don't include the lighting. This is because lighting and shadows can change the drawing dramatically; being able to make changes to them, without altering the other layers, is incredibly useful. But this time because I already knew what lighting I wanted, how intense it is and where it's going to be, working it into the same layer just made a lot of sense. The execution though, wasn't without concerns. Doing the lighting along with the base colour and shading felt like a gamble the entire time. I was constantly worrying about the energy effects not working as intended; feeling uncomfortable seeing all the large white areas that seemingly makes no sense at the moment. 

Thankfully, it all worked out. This gives me more confidence in continuing with this method; I was worried I wasn't skilled enough to colour like this.

On another note, I haven't been posting as frequently as I wanted to lately. This is partly because I've been figuring out how to keep myself more productive while not burning myself out. I can't say I've even kinda figured it out, but I've got a direction at least.

Hope you enjoyed the drawing, and hopefully see you soon.

No comments:

Post a Comment