July Pin-up - Iroh (Patreon)

Oh gosh!!! It's been such a busy end of the month for me - finally had time to tackle the pin-up piece for this month! Now after today's rest, I'll resume doing the layouts for some new Apparition pages ((:

 Let's start this post, shall we? Iroh is such a nice comfort character, I had lots of fun reconnecting with him!

> Wanted this piece to depict a cute family moment between Iroh and Zuko over the Jasmine Dragon! It's super hot yet Iroh is still drinking hot tea... much to Zuko's dismay. Alternatively, I've been told it looks like Iroh is letting out a huge ass fire belch!! Guess interpretation is free for the beholder hehe!

> After freehanding the thumbnail, I decided to bring some perspective tools to scribble around a bit more and "ground" the scene, as to make it look a bit more natural.

> Did the structure pass for the boys! Iroh is more on the heavy side and wanted to make Zuko brooding. Whenever I tackle this part of the sketch, I always keep in mind motion and emotion, everything will develop from the rawest depiction of those.

> Iroh's face! His Earth Kingdom attire has this cute little braid that I wanted to bring along.

> Polished zuko! 

> At this stage I started to bring more life to the background - specially a white jade bush! In retrospect I should have done a white dragon bush but EH let's keep going! 

Also a very important thing happened at this step, notice how in the step previous to this there was a huge window......? Initially I wanted to place a window there with a design I looked up from the show. I gathered screenshots and decided to redo it myself as practice and study, which you can check the result here:

 But then............

 I noticed..................

 I've done a very similar composition to this one before???!!! Even down to the circle frame of the window....  NO WAY I'd let that go through, I'm too proud for that!!! Even though it was totally accidental, it still makes me a bit frustrated!!

> After my pocket size creative crisis, I went to the lineart! This time I did something different for the lines and colors as well. Usually I do everything in the current process at once but this time I kinda tackled one thing at a time. 

 So here, I started with the foremost element, Iroh!

> Then the table, along the tea set. I know there's some basic perspective mistakes but tbh I think it's a thing that doesn't look too jarring in my style. For me, my style has this crazy thing that has both precision and unevenness, and I've been honestly trying to learn to embrace it. Will always keep studying the matter though!

 Even though the perspective isn't flawless, I really liked the textures here. Love working with different materials!

> Then, did the lineart for the character that is the most far away in the foreground - zuko! Foreground is finished. I ended up doing some adjustments to the lines as they were needed along the piece but for now here it is!

> Background!!! not much line weight variation, creates a pleasing contrast between different depths. Check out that ornament to the left which was supposed to be a window - no way I wouldn't be using it riiiight!

> This time was special as well in the point that I was kinda secure on the colors I'd work with so I didn't do a color sketch!! wanted to set up the refined mood of Jasmine Dragon.... I also LOVE the jasmine flower and the green, white and yellow combination is very beautiful, what reassured me in going in blind.

> Setting up other colors, gradients, polish, polish.....

> Rendered the special elements (table, tea cup, flowers) with a bit more of detail! Been learning how to distribute detail in my pieces, as to help visual hierarchy in the composition.

>FLATS! Gosh I love Earth Kingdom colorssss.... this was def fun. In Apparition people in Anthuria uses lots of greens so this piece was definitely a great study for that.

> Decided to tackle the fire breathing first LOL really don't know why. I think it was insecurity - I  love doing special effects but I have so much trouble regarding fire.  I still hope I didn't do it weirdly or if it overwhelmed the composition!!!

> Now for the shadows, usually I'd do all primary shadows, then all secondary shadows. But this time I did both for each character individually! Notice I didn't shade most of Iroh's body, he's not ripped so I wanted softness to prevail here. 

>Rendered Iroh! Along with some cute sweat drops. Also I did some extra effects in the tea and tea cup to show it's hot!

>Did the shadows for Zuko. As to practice the detail thing we were talking earlier - I tried only doing primary shadows for him. I'd say it worked out!

> From there, I finished the drawing! But here's the thing, fire is such a complicated topic for me, I wanted to experiment a biiiit. Fire truly shines when it's dim and dark, so I may have put myself in a very difficult situation when drawing Iroh doing his fire breathing in a such well lit place...... I could say a nailed it, but I also wanted to play with how fiery his fire could get. Then I made an alt version where I turned everything dark and redder - everything but the fire!

 And that concludes our monthly pin-up post! I'll be opening the voting for the next character on the 1st, I'm looking forward to it!! :D