the other day Lashito asked if I would draw a dragon. Initially I didn't want to because every time I've attempted one It was a rather tedious deal. For me dragons are enormously complex: they have four legs, long tails, wings, horns, scales and claws. The legs tails and horns I can manage but the wings and scales are a horror because of the necessary amount of detail. The wings alone must be a certain length (to be flight worthy) correctly jointed (the wing is essentially a large hand which I still fail at to a degree) and the skin or surface area of the wing must look like it would be able to sustain lift. The scales must be handled carefully to contour muscles and bone yet maintain a size patter and shading. Often the end result was an incomplete sketch lost to time. The same can be said for rendering full digital works. Even with the pad, my digital works tend to lose the subtlety and elegance of my hand drawn pieces.

This time around I decided to take another pot shot at this, but with a different goal in mind. The goal was not to overachieve and knock socks off but to prove to myself I could still draw a recognizable dragon. To test the waters I settled on a fairly static shot (when trying something new it's best to have something familiar coupled with it to prevent me from quitting). The initial sketch was based more on a dino than a dragon but it worked so I moved on to color. I knew color was going to be my saving grace in this piece considering the lackluster sketch so I chose the best weapon in my new arsenal to get the job done: Complementary Colors.

For those who don't know about color theory, it is essentially two opposing colors like purple & yellow, red & green, etc. that have an effect of intensifying and brightening each other. This coloring method is more appeasing to the eye and I thought it would be perfect to pick up the slack from the line-art. My two main colors were green and red. The most notable instances of use are in the dragons hide and the sky. The other colors used were to further place focus on the two main colors. the yellow blending the two main colors while the dark brown popped them forward.

For an exercise the results are promising but I'll be sure to refine it in the next major piece I've planed (after the two currently int the works).

Overall This was a fun side project and has rekindled my interest in drawing dragons so expect to see more in the future!

(didn't mean to leave the color pallet in but oh well)