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 comic book-style piece I did based on a character in a book called "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck". It's a pretty unconventional self-help book, as the author (Mark Manson) argues against the general self-help industry, referring to it as a culture of mindless positivity that isn't practical or helpful for most people.
But anyway, in the second chapter, he writes about a character called the Disappointment Panda, and I was inspired to draw this:
If you wanna know the context behind this character, I recommend reading the book, or check out my post as I uploaded some screenshots from the relevant section there.
Anyway last year, I was pretty obsessed with Stardew Valley for a while. Which if you didn't know, is an indie farming simulator game developed an amazingly talented guy, Eric "ConcernedApe" Barone.
Source: wccftech
I love everything about Stardew Valley. The visuals are so adorable and well done, the art is beautiful, the gameplay is solid, and the music is phenomenal! I actually wrote about a couple of songs from Stardew; the most recent of which was in February when I started the month of Love songs!
Anyway, there are actually paintings you can acquire in-game, and my favourite painting is definitely this one called Jade Hills.
Source: Stardew Valley Wiki
I absolutely love this painting in the game; it always gives me a sense of calm and serenity whenever I look at it. So I thought it'd be cool to try to replicate it in real life! That way I can see it in my actual house too!
And yes, that is the biggest picture I can find of the exact painting from the game. So I had to work off this.
This was my preliminary sketch. I wasn't sure if I wanted the painting exactly like it, since I was gonna be using watercolours to replicate pixel art. But I tried my best.
I decided to change one of the trees to add some contrast.
Time to get painting!
I didn't really know what I wanted to do about the trees, since 1) tbh I didn't know how to paint/draw realistic trees, and 2) I wanted it to be somewhat accurate to the game's painting so it would be recognizable.
So I just kept the trees like that. I know it looks a little elementary school-ish, and I apologise for that. It's tough to draw trees okay.
The pine tree is a slightly darker green since that's how they're like in-game. And I probably made the mountains a tad dark unfortunately.
So I lightened and smoothened them a little bit. With the power of water!
Next was the river and the rest of the grass:
When the paint was dry, I added in some details on the trees, since they were supposed to be in the foreground and all.
For this, I used the official Stardew Valley guidebook art as a reference.
Source: eBay
This picture looked so cute, so I emulated the trees after it. I also added a couple of details on the grass, and the end product was this:
I was pretty pleased when I finished this painting. But now that I look at it again, I'm not too happy with it tbh. I mean, it looks pretty much exactly like the one in-game, and I was as accurate as I could be I think.
But now that I'm learning how to draw and paint trees better I kinda wanna try drawing a more "realistic" version of this. I might change the perspective a little bit, so that it seems like you're on the ground with the trees beside the river and all that. I can kinda envision how I want it to look like in my head, but I think it might be tough translating that into a sketch on paper. And man, isn't that always the way.
I'm actually currently working on a few Stardew-related pieces (4 to be exact) atm, and after I'm done with those I'll probably take a break from Stardew paintings and draw some doggos or something. But I'll likely revisit this when I'm in the mood to do another Stardew painting.
Until then, stay tuned!
Thanks so much for reading!
To find out more about me, check out my intro post here!
