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, and lets me track my progress too!
So back in December 2019, my eldest brother gave me an early Christmas present - Pokémon Sword! Well technically he bought both copies as a set and said I could choose which one I wanted and I chose Sword! It was such a pleasant surprise and I felt like I should return the favour and gift him something for Christmas too, so I decided on a painting!
Source: Nintendo
He's been an avid rock climber for years, and has even represented Singapore in the Asia Games! Since he had just started playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on the Switch at the time I decided to paint him something BoTW-related. Personally when I first started playing the game and got Link climbing up cliffs all the time, I was always reminded of my brother and how he can actually do that irl. So I thought of drawing him and Link racing up Dueling Peaks!
In the game, Dueling Peaks is a pair of mountains with a narrow divide separating them, and a river running through the middle. It is said that it was originally a single mountain but was eventually split in two by a dragon god living in Hyrule to forge a way through.
Source: Zelda Fandom
Well anyway, time to get sketching!
This was my first sketch, which I actually did in under 20 minutes! For Link, I referenced the above wallpaper, and I just did a silhouette for my brother. Then I realised I made him too big which ruined the perspective I was going for, so I needed to make some adjustments.
So after some scale changes and outlining, this was what it looked like!
I might have made my brother look a little chonky but he is pretty buff tbf, so ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Next it was time to paint!
I was going to paint a sunset in the background so the silhouette of my brother would make sense. And I had to make that mountain darker as well.
I also mixed some gouache paints to get the right shade of blue and green for Link's Hero outfit. It took a while and I think it's not exactly right still, but it's close enough. I then used markers for the details like those on his sleeve.
Next was the background!
I didn't really have much of a reference for this, other than pictures and screenshots. I wanted it to be somewhat accurate, so I actually turned on my game and fast traveled to Dueling Peaks to see what the background looked like, but it was mostly fields and mountains so I did my best.
I might have screwed up the blending a little bit for the background, and I accidentally painted over what was supposed to be the clouds. I tried my best to fix it but I couldn't do much, sadly.
This was after I added details in the mountain and outlined Link:
The rock divets were kinda challenging actually. I kept thinking I was screwing it up and it looked weird because I was just drawing random lines curling every which way. But I think it actually turned out okay!
After that I wanted to add a couple more details in the background to make it more accurate and less plain, so I checked the game again. Unfortunately the camera was a little uncooperative but I figured out there was a shrine with a shallow lake surrounding it, a stable and of course the Great Plateau Tower.
So I decided to add those in!
I used markers for those and I think I may have made the stable a little too big for the perspective, but I couldn't really erase it or anything so I just had to stick with it.
I also added some lines to indicate the creases in Link's pants, but I'm not sure if they came out right.
Overall, I think this piece was pretty alright; I was quite pleased with it! The perspective was good for something I've never done before, and the details were pretty solid. Not to mention the fact that I also managed to complete the sketch pretty quickly, so yay!
I also posted this piece on the BoTW and Zelda subreddit and got a couple nice comments! Such wholesome people. 😌
I also did a small piece for my brother's wife, but I unfortunately screwed it up by using watercolour paint on a canvas. I was going for a tropical forest kinda painting and really screwed it up with the watercolour.
So, I did another piece on a watercolour paper and just stuck it on the back to make it better!
And it looked a lot better imo. I just told my sis-in-law to leave it at that and not flip it so I could hide my mistake. I think she was pleasantly surprised at the flip and decided that this one looked better indeed.
Well anyway, that's all for now! And I think that's finally the last piece for 2019! Now I've cleared my backlog from last year! So look forward to the next post to see my first (and biggest) piece for 2020!
Thanks so much for reading!
To find out more about me, check out my intro post here!
