Welcome to the second day of my step-by-step progressions of the “Haiku Ewe” comics I drew for last week’s run on GoComics.com. Written by Big Al the gal, the art is completely my interpretation of her haikus. As with yesterday’s post, I’ll keep my comments minimal while letting the art speak for itself. Enjoy!
This was my first pencil rough that I sent to Big Al for her approval which she gave. However, afterwards, I felt the sheep’s expression was too sinister. It looked as though she was stepping on the horn on purpose, and it was supposed to look accidental.This was my second pass. Putting a more frightened/helpless look on the sheep’s face really helped get the accidental concept across better.This is the final pencil (with just a tad of paint on it). I used the Black Grape again for foreground lines, and used lighter colors the further I went back to help create a little depth.Here’s the piece fully painted in watercolor. You’ll notice flicks in the ground plane which were put there by masking off the area around it and flicking paint with a tooth brush. You might notice the addition of a mouse, too. I couldn’t help myself. It’s all rather flat at the moment until….…the final. I lifted some highlights out of the cave with just a wet brush, and added a sweat drop to the sheep’s face. That branch off the side of the cave was in the way, so it was digitally removed. In placing the text, the area behind the letters was digitally lightened so they’d read better. And colored pencil all around was added.
On the official “Haiku Ewe” post on GoComics.com, the idea that a random horn just happened to be there in the wild seemed ludicrous to some readers. I let them know that it was left over from a Girl Scout who came by selling cookies one day.
Check back again tomorrow for Wednesday’s step-by-step progression!
