Obake Inspiration 3

It's Pinnotheres again!  I done did more draws.  And I finally actually figured out what I wanted to show about the kitsune project.

This entry is about a recent digital project I did for a friend who is in a tabletop gaming group with me.  Yes, I occasionally play D&D-type games with my geeknerd and nerdgeek crowd and something that gamers occasionally like to have is different artists’ interpretations of the characters they develop.  Happily, this character coincided with my recent obake obsession, and is definitely the digital drawing of which I am most proud to date.  I was also really happy with the sketch.

Sneaky sneaky!  Nevermind the crease right across her face...I SAID NEVERMIND IT!!!

The character is a 9-tailed kitsune, or fox obake.  Traditionally, kitsune can assume animal and human form, and the number of tails they have coincides with how old and powerful they are (see my bakeneko post for the cat version of a multi-tailed obake).  Kitsune can have up to 9 tails, and show up in modern manga and anime.  Naruto is a popular anime series on both sides of the Pacific that features a 9 tailed fox spirit as the protagonist.

The conversion begins.  Bust lines only.  Almost artsy!

Where's me feets?

Tails and a bit of shading!

As the project grew, I got bolder with shading and sent my friend bits and pieces so she could follow and comment on the character and how I was doing capturing a combined vision of her creation.   I kept seeing the character best as captured in a half-changed state.  I have no idea where the 80s style hair came from, but that’s art for you.  At least, that’s MY art for you.  My best decisions are usually made by some part of my brain that doesn’t like to explain itself.

Eventually, my friend asked if I would include some nod to the traditional red line patterns on Japanese kitsune masks (Google kitsune masks.  Seriously.).  Fortunately, I had arbitrarily made the decision to dress this gal in red as well.  

The "finished" product.  At least, the I am now willing to send this to her and tell her it's done product.

The final product was still subtle on shading.  In my current sketches and in my continuing attempts at digital conversion, I am really working on getting crazier with shading.  I also recently dug up a bunch of old sketchbooks.  Man, I used to be really bold at crosshatching, and it worked!  When did I lose that??

Comin’ up from me, more digital conversions, fantasy characters, and maybe some random puppetry stuff.  Yeah, I did that once too…and my most recent attempt at getting back to it was also not as good as my former, more fearless attempts.  Oh, the audacity of youth…

Love and artsy fartsies by

Pinnotheres.