Starting to paint at last...

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I haven't actually finished all of my 13 drawings yet, but the big ol' part II to these pictures, the painting, has been looming over my head so I went ahead and got started.  The drawings are complete (I think!) for 7 of them, so I'm taking some time to get at least a handful of them rolling with the painting aspect.  2 more of the drawings are done except for the background patterns.  That leaves 3 more drawings that are just practically a glimmer in my eye at this point :)

Argh, painting is very... challenging for me :)  Confession: I'm more comfortable with lines than with color and value.  So I am really welcoming this series so that I can get more faster and more better (yes, I know that's not grammatically correct) at painting!  Right now, because I'm at the beginning stages of painting these, I'm still figuring out some of my decisions about my style and technique that will be affecting all of them.

I am scanning my drawings at 600 dpi and painting in Photoshop CS6 if anyone is wondering :)

Frigg, Queen of Asgard

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Today I was working on this drawing of Frigg, the queen of Asgard.  She's married to Odin and both of them sit at times on the high seat and look out over the universe.

Here I've drawn her spinning the clouds (one of her pastimes, using her special distaff -- a thing used for spinning wool normally).

I struggled a bit with this one, and drew a different version first that I scrapped.  No, you may not see it.  I am 100% happier with this version.

Today's drawing: an 8-Legged Challenge

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Here's the drawing I was working on mainly today.  This is Sleipnir, Odin's 8-legged horse.  Fun fact, Loki is actually his mother.  From this time that he shape-shifted into the form of a mare.

I was looking forward to this drawing because I really like drawing horses.  But very challenging to try to make eight legs on a horse "look right."

Just gotta figure out the background pattern on this one...

Odin drawing

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Quick update: here's the drawing I was working on today -- Odin, obvs.  He has a lot of creatures associated with him (his two wolves, his two ravens, his eight-legged horse, etc.), but I decided to just focus on his ravens that bring him all the doings of the world (gossip!).  Behind you see his fancy throne, and just a general Norse pattern in the background.  I really like the composition on this one.

:)

Draw, draw, draw

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So here's an update on how my project has been going.  At this early-ish stage, I'm just working on the drawings, not the paintings yet.

It's been wonderful getting to spend such extended time at my drawing board!

I started out by revisiting the pieces that I had already done a lot of work on (see previous posts) and seeing if I could improve them.  I did the most work, I think, on changing some things for my Freyja picture (below you'll see reference photos for her hand that I took of myself), but I've also totally changed the figure on the Thor picture.  The other changes were a little more minor.

Above you'll see a photo of a new one I'm working on for the Norse goddes, Nott (Thor's grandma).  She rides along the sky to bring night to the world every day.  I'm excited to get to put a cool horse in this one.

I'm itching to do some dragons, so maybe I'll work on that creature next.  I'm still deciding if I'm going to do Nidhogg (the dragon who perpetually gnaws on the roots of the world tree), or Jormungandr a.k.a. the Midgard Serpent (the sea serpent who encircles the world)

Well, off to draw some more!