Hey Hive!
We're back again with another Art Attack! If you're new to the series, this is where I share my paintings and the process behind them. A behind-the-scenes look at my artwork, if you will. This is not to say that I'm very good at art, or that I'm a professional in any way. In fact this is the opposite, and serves as a reminder to how I first started.
So last week, I shared a recreation of a painting from one of my favourite games, Stardew Valley!
Stardew Valley has in-game paintings that you can put up in your house as decorations, and my absolute favourite one looks something similar to this, called Jade Hills! Even though it turned out looking kinda elementary school-ish, I kinda like it. It's pretty much the closest I can see to how it actually looks in-game (which is pixel art).
Anyway last October, Sean and I got busy relocating and we bought our very first set of IKEA furniture! We built 2 chairs and a desk (for me). I kinda got tired out halfway and may have taken a nap while he finished up the desk. So as a thank you, and in celebration of him finally getting his own desk at work, I drew him something for his desk!
He had started working at Singapore Tourism Board, and didn't have a dedicated desk until about 2 months since he started. It was quite an important milestone, since he was finally done with orientation and training and joining a department.
Anyway, the tourism mascot for Singapore is this merlion (our famous monument) called Merli! She's really cute, and I thought of making stickers with her drinking boba/bubble tea and her holding a plate of chicken rice (Sean's favourite dish). But then I started getting more and more ideas that eventually culminated into this:
I also wanted to have Sean's name on it so his colleagues would know it's his desk, and it'd be easy to locate if they ever need to find him.
But I did add some other embellishments like stars and duckies to make it a little more unique. I mean, no one else has this at their desk so I guess it's already unique but still.
I know I totally screwed up that smiley in the top right. Urgh.
I think I might've gotten a bit too carried away though. If you recall when I did the character compilation challenge I wrote that other artists like to squeeze their characters together like sardines. So that's what I wanted to try here. I'm not sure it turned out so well though.
For the other merlions I copied the ones from Sean's STB bag, that looks like this:
I actually really like this bag, and I thought the design was really cool! And the merlions looked so cute so I thought I'd copy them. I might've drawn them a tad too long though, which is probably why mine doesn't look as good, unfortunately. 😔
I didn't know what to do about the little merlions, so I just gave them colour highlights. I didn't want to detract from making Merli the focal point, which is why here's one of her in the middle under his name.
I'm not sure what I would've done differently tbh. I think maybe making the background not white for starters? But I was using a different sketchbook that wasn't very suitable for paints so I had no way of colouring the background other than perhaps markers. But yea I think making the background a sunset orange-y pink would be good. And making the little merlions stubbier.
Oh well, at least Sean liked it. And that's all that matters. When he got to the office, he laminated and put it up at his desk. And got quite a few compliments about it if I recall. 😊
I think the yellow rays radiating out of the middle Merli was a nice touch at least.
Anyway, I guess this is kind of a second mini character compilation challenge? I still need to get better at them obviously. Some shadows would be good to convey the foreground and background, for example. It's okay though, remember when it comes to art, there's no right or wrong; just do what feels right to you!
Thanks so much for reading!
To find out more about me, check out my intro post here!
Check out my previous post in this series!
