Volcanic Dragon
Date: : College Sophomore, August, 2011
Time: Many hours of painting, separated by several days waiting for paint to dry between painting sessions.
Materials: Oil paints, brushes, 12x9 canvas
Description: A detailed dragon head with white/gray teeth and spikes, brown scales of different sizes and shapes, light brown/tan scales on the top of the dragon with red and black scales on the bottom of the dragon. Spines along its back in red, and white spines lining the sides of the top of the dragon. The background is a barren empty wasteland with a volcano erupting in the distance behind the dragon. The sky is gray except for the red and brown smoke from the volcano eruption. The dragon matches the colors of the background.
Artist Comments: This is the fourth and final canvas of summer 2011. After having practice with oil paints on three different canvases, I was able to set out to do one of my goals in life, to draw a detailed dragon head with scales and everything. It took a lot of planning to draw it, first I drew it in pencil on another paper, and then I had to transfer that drawing to the canvas, which is rather hard as I do not usually draw the same thing twice. Then I had to paint each individual scale and that took quite a bit of concentration and experimentation. I painted new scales over the old scales quite a bit as I couldn’t quite get them right in some areas. Finally, I was satisfied with it (except for a few parts which would take a lot more effort to change so I figured I would leave them for photoshop or something). Then I started on the background. At first I just placed a few rocks here and there, but it looked a little boring so I added a few canyons and cracks. I made the volcano and the sky was originally all red. Later, I changed it to gray to bring my dragon out a little more and give a bit more contrast to the picture. It took several tries and paint-overs to get the lava spouting from the volcano just the way I wanted it.
After doing the background, I also had to go back over the edges of the dragon again so I could get them in straight lines so that the dragon popped out more. I took a long time to get the bottom red/black scales of the dragon with the right consistency.
Time: Many hours of painting, separated by several days waiting for paint to dry between painting sessions.
Materials: Oil paints, brushes, 12x9 canvas
Description: A detailed dragon head with white/gray teeth and spikes, brown scales of different sizes and shapes, light brown/tan scales on the top of the dragon with red and black scales on the bottom of the dragon. Spines along its back in red, and white spines lining the sides of the top of the dragon. The background is a barren empty wasteland with a volcano erupting in the distance behind the dragon. The sky is gray except for the red and brown smoke from the volcano eruption. The dragon matches the colors of the background.
Artist Comments: This is the fourth and final canvas of summer 2011. After having practice with oil paints on three different canvases, I was able to set out to do one of my goals in life, to draw a detailed dragon head with scales and everything. It took a lot of planning to draw it, first I drew it in pencil on another paper, and then I had to transfer that drawing to the canvas, which is rather hard as I do not usually draw the same thing twice. Then I had to paint each individual scale and that took quite a bit of concentration and experimentation. I painted new scales over the old scales quite a bit as I couldn’t quite get them right in some areas. Finally, I was satisfied with it (except for a few parts which would take a lot more effort to change so I figured I would leave them for photoshop or something). Then I started on the background. At first I just placed a few rocks here and there, but it looked a little boring so I added a few canyons and cracks. I made the volcano and the sky was originally all red. Later, I changed it to gray to bring my dragon out a little more and give a bit more contrast to the picture. It took several tries and paint-overs to get the lava spouting from the volcano just the way I wanted it.
After doing the background, I also had to go back over the edges of the dragon again so I could get them in straight lines so that the dragon popped out more. I took a long time to get the bottom red/black scales of the dragon with the right consistency.
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