Here we are! I decided to go for a 20” x 8” canvas, which would mirror the effect of a standard 10” x 8” picture book! I will only be using brushes in my illustration library, so the intention is to see what kind of effect I can capture with my go-to equipment!

Here is the rough sketch for our drawing. As most of you know, I’m not one for detailed sketches, as most of it becomes about exploration along the way. This is actually version two of the sketch, as version one was completely illegible haha. I knew that I really wanted to play with scale again, and leave a big potion of our page open to fill with the environment!

As a fun side note, I actually based the dragons pose off of my dog, Wes. He’s a big boy, but likes to tuck up incredibly small, and hits this pose a couple times a day. Personally I feel like the dragon’s personality probably matches his pretty well too.

Setting up some depth here! I tend to hop between darker background or darker foreground depending on what I’m illustrating. This will be the second time using green as the background color, and that is for a specific reason. Our dragon is the complimentary color to our background, its exact opposite on the color wheel, so it will really pop. I think there are times to avoid this (though I often don’t0 and other times to really lean in. This is the latter!

You know I love some trees! During this step we are generally blocking where we want our intersecting lines to be. Don’t be afraid to throw in some objects that overlap your main subject as it makes the setting more believable! In this case we are using the trees to frame both of our characters really nicely, so the eye knows exactly where to look.

Next we can add some extra detail to the trees. Branches, uneven textures, anything to break up the rigidity. I only added a few branches. I figure for the dragon to be as big as he is, most of the branches are probably up higher than we are seeing.

Adding some light texture to the trees, so grass, and beginning to block out our dragon friend.

Here is a zoomed in view as I played with some value to start. A lot of this will continue to be carved out throughout the drawing, but getting an idea of where your lighter and darker values are early can be super helpful when it comes to lighting later on.

Adding a bit more detail, including the skin texture and the design down the back.

One thing I loved about this dragon the first time I drew it, back in 2022 was the scale detail. I didn’t have a rhyme or reason for it then, and I don’t now, but it feels very unique, so it was important I kep that as a main element.

Now adding some extra detail to the face and surrounding areas.

Once the base of our dragon is finished, we can begin blocking out our other character. I also extended one of the dragons arms for the sake of scale.

Adding in a bit of detail on our female character now. Almost time for some light and shadow!

Here is the first round of shading on our characters to give them some depth. I will add a bit more later so they pop from far away, but I think this step absolutley brings them to life. Now to do the same on the environment!

Here we added some definition to the trees, and some light poking through the forest to fill out the environment, while direct your eye back to the characters. To finish I am going to add a bit more depth to the ground and both of our friends.

And there we have it! I feel like I could go through and continue adding details, include more animals, rework the expressions and features of our characters, and beyond, but this project gave me exactly what I needed. The energy was what I hoped to capture, and to me it says there is much more to be discovered.

This is one of several projects that I am now working towards as “A Robot Called Rodger” makes its way to editors. The story has yet to be finished, and ideas are still being explored, but I can’t wait to give you more updates in the future. As always, thank you for being here with me, please enjoy a zoomed in view of our characters below.