Hi guys! I finally tokenized my pixelart _ I'm quite attached to this drawing and I couldn't decide on the price, so I set it to offers only. There is only 1 edition, as I want it to be special.
Knownorigin - Cosmic Cthulhu There you can read a little extra story.
This was my first extra detailed pixelart and it motivated me to create more big scenes ever since. I love the Lovecraft's stories that I have read so far and I have a few more left, and then I want to reread them. I've read a bunch of fan fiction as well, I really like the The Innsmouth Legacy by Ruthanna Emrys.
About the art
I began with the Cthulu's description:
In "The Call of Cthulhu", H. P. Lovecraft describes a statue of Cthulhu as "A monster of vaguely anthropoid outline, but with an octopus-like head whose face was a mass of feelers, a scaly, rubbery-looking body, prodigious claws on hind and fore feet, and long, narrow wings behind." Source: Wikipedia
Octopus-like head
Scaly, rubbery body
Long claws
Long narrow wings
I started the sketch with the round octopus-like head, then marked the torso and the arms placement. I first thought of drawing him reaching for a boat in the ocean as Cthulhu originates from Southeast Pacific Ocean. However, I felt that it would be hard to transition well from water to Cthulhu and then stormy sky. I decided to make it more mysterious- floating in space.
The yoga position was a random inspiration in the moment, and it adds a more wise pose to the monster. I drew the face more wise looking and wrinkled than menacing or spiky.
The claws are actually long nails making the creature less scary and looking more like an old wise seer looking into a crystal ball.
The third eye and 6 fingers/toes are my additional design ideas, making the monster more personalized.
I also collected as much varied Cthulhu art as I could find on Pinterest
Before animating I made a list of the elements:
- Floating Body
- Wings
- The spheres
- Hands (slight animation
- Head Tentacles (slight)
- Stars
- Blinking eyes
It's recommended for pixel art animations to be at least 8 frames, but each additional frame requires more planning.
I reused frames whenever possible, mostly animating 3 key frames.
Before doing the line art I decided that I would use mostly greens and blues, the more traditional Cthulhu colors.
Pixel Art
First I scaled down the pencil sketch as much as possible, without losing too much details. I drew the outline roughly first and made a few proportion adjustments. Afterwards I cleaned up the outline. The most common way is to avoid jumbled pixels and zooming out a lot to see if the lines look smooth. It takes a bit of practice, but for bigger drawings tiny outline mistakes become less visible.
I started with very strong green and dark tones, which I adjusted afterwards to my liking. It is important to get started, afterwards it is easier to make adjustments.
I worked with very dark tones for most of the drawing. In the end I added a lot of brightness and contrast, because some monitors show less color and contrast (like my laptop vs monitor).
The decision to keep or remove the outline is mostly based on preference. The outline can save a lot of time, and it can be easily blended with the local colors, it doesn't have to stay black. For stronger visibility I used some rim light, because I wanted a dark background.
When I got stuck I started adding some subtle textures to make the skin more interesting.
I left the sphere for last in case I decided to change it's size. I didn't want to make it too difficult to animate so I draw a very quick full map, which I cut into 6 pieces and distorted slightly for animation.
The stars and constellations are soft and mostly small, to not distract from the main composition. Based on some feedback I received, I decided to not use the moon.
Final art
I animated in Aseprite, with only 4 layers and an additional one for the moon which I decided to remove.
Bonus:
Little clay Cthulhu I sculpted many years ago :D I should try sculpting it again xD
Dragon head winner: 
You can win a head by commenting :D
I'll wait 1 more day for the Giant Frog buyer to pick the next dragon head, otherwise I'll pick random and reserve the second edition for when I find who it is (sorry I can't check buyer history right for now) ^^
Thank you for checking out this long post! I hope you enjoyed it ^^ I've originally posted this few years ago when I first drew it, I mainly fixed a bunch of typos. I have another new pixelart tutorial planned soon, I just need to finish the text explaining the steps ^^