Welcome to my blog.

Hello everyone. I hope you're all doing well. Today I'm here to show you a new anime-style illustration for the Hive account@splinterlands art contest. This time, I'm creating a Crystal Jaguar.

What history tells us about these felines is that during the historic Light Obliteration, a family of cats lived deep within one of the caves in the Crystal Forest. These cats were saved from the wave of destruction. Over time, with no competition for food, these cats grew to incredible size.

My version of the Crystal Jaguar is an anime reinterpretation. When I decided to reinterpret the Crystal Jaguar from the Splinterlands game, I didn't want to copy its original design. My goal was to do it while retaining its essence, more stylized, more my own. The result is this feline that retains the strength of the original.

The first thing that stands out in my version is the color palette. While the original Crystal Jaguar is dominated by green and blue hues, with armor of emerald gems and blue energy light, my creature has a varied color palette of intense purples and crystals that glow with their own light. The jaguar's body is covered in dark, almost black fur, with purple spots that represent the texture of a real feline. The crystal embedded in its forehead is not a simple ornament; it is its core of power. The other crystals, which are like armor, were carved with precision and rendered with golden lines that make it look like a sacred being.

The style I chose is distinctly anime, but with a more detailed approach. The lines are clean, the lines are defined, and the jaguar's expression conveys strength and protection. Its yellow eyes, with slanted pupils, signal that it is aggressive yet intelligent, always alert to its surroundings. Unlike the original design, which focuses on a more frontal posture, my version adopts a more dynamic pose, as if moving among the crystals surrounding it.

The background is another important element in this reinterpretation. Instead of a flat environment, he decided to create a crystal jungle, a forest where vegetation coexists with crystals. The green trees make a notable difference with the purple crystals emerging from the ground. This background complements the jaguar.

Compared to the Crystal Jaguar from Splinterlands, my version is somewhat different and doesn't aim to be the same as the original. In the game, the jaguar is a combat card, with abilities like Thorns and Retaliate, designed to return damage and resist melee attacks. Its design is optimized to convey resilience, aggression, and usefulness in tactics. In contrast, my crystal jaguar seeks to show us something more. It's not just about what it can do in battle, but what it represents: a creature fused with crystals, which has evolved to become a feline stronger than its predecessors.

The use of crystals in my design also serves a purpose. The crystals aren't just decorative elements, they also represent the power and memory of the environment, and they have great defensive power. Each crystal on its body is well-positioned: the one on its forehead serves as a nucleus, the one on its shoulders as crystals that give it greater strength, and the ones on its legs give it great movement. Something I didn't mention, but is important, is that these crystals, which are its armor, reflect the damage dealt to these felines.

Another aspect that differentiates my version from the original is the integration of a story through the background. In the game, the background is usually dark or, in some cases, nonexistent; it's a texture that accompanies the card. Here, the background is just as important as the jaguar itself. The forest crystals reflect its energy and can emit light at night. The trees seem to be leaning, giving the jaguar more prominence, and the light passing through the leaves creates an atmosphere as if everything were bowing down to the jaguar.

This jaguar is not a copy, not a replica. It's a creature born from my imagination, bearing my vision, my colors. It's my way of reinterpreting the original design, but also expanding on it, bringing it to something more personal, deeper.

In short, my version of Crystal Jaguar is a fusion of the wild and the magical, of anime and fantasy, of reinterpretation and original creation. It's a creature that not only fights, but survives. And in every stroke, every crystal, every shadow in the forest, there's a part of me.