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ratcreature — Merlin: Fealty
Published: 2011-01-05 09:07:49 +0000 UTC; Views: 5395; Favourites: 47; Downloads: 825
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Description
I made this for the Yuletart gift exchange for Chen_san, originally posted here. Art betas were Goss and Vito_excalibur. It is set in the future. After Arthur becomes king Merlin swears an oath of fealty in a commendation ceremony to him.Media: Acrylic paint on paper; original size is roughly 34 x 32cm; scanned in parts and assembled digitally with some minor corrections in GIMP (hopefully not too noticeable). For more detail, see the process post .
(December 2010)
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Comments: 23
This is amazing! There's so much going on, but everything seems so balanced. Great piece!!
By the way, the thrones are AWESOME.
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Thank you! I'm happy you enjoyed it.
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Oh, and I forgot to say, the shadow of the staff on the steps is awesome.
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That is SUCH a complex picture, you have got so many people in it and so much scenery...but it all works so well as a coherent whole.
There's so much detail in it too...I loved the banners behind them, and the candelabra, and that Arthur is now wearing a pendant similar to Uther's.
(And for some reason I'm really keen on the bottoms of Merlin's boots...I love the way you've painted those...)
Beautiful work. (Do you mind me asking how long it took to paint?)
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Thank you! I'm glad you like it, and that the detail works for you.
I haven't kept track exactly how long it took, the idea and first sketches were done in early November, and then it went through all the pencils and corrections you can see in the process post I linked in the notes, and I was late with the deadline on Nov 30 only finally submitting it on December 4. I'm quite slow, and especially with drawing I often get distracted rather than working focussed for hours (that's better once have the pencils and can paint it), so the sketches and pencil revisions drag out for a while in time, but not that many actual work hours considering the days. The painting of the pencils itself stretched over almost two weeks, but then I worked on it several hours on most days, especially as I was overdue for the deadline. In total I'm fairly sure it took well over 100 hours of work.
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Oh, I'd missed the link to the process post. I just went off to look at it. Oh, that was fascinating.
It was really interesting to see how you built the painting up. I tend to work in the exact reverse. (As I'm always worried my faces will be a disaster...and if it turns out that I can't get them right, then I know I won't have to bother doing all the background etc. *G*)
That sounds like an awful lot of work. Well, worth it though, it turned out brilliantly.
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I'm not sure why I tend to work from background to foreground, but I think it is because I can build up and gauge colors better this way. Then the important parts are finished last, and I can make them fit best with the rest, because I see them in the final color context while I paint and can pick the right colors by trial and error, rather than having to imagine the rest while doing focus of interest.
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Yeah, that sounds a good method.
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On the floor next to Merlin, is that the staff he got from those fairy people?
AMAZING! Great attention to detail. LOVE IT!!!!
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Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed it.
I didn't draw that specific fairy staff from a reference, but it was that kind of staff that I was thinking of. I remember seeing several magical characters have a wooden staff with some sort of gem/stone at the top on the show.
The reason I made the stone blue was actually because I wanted to have another blue bit besides Gaius' clothing to balance it a little, even if it is just a tiny spot. Gwen's gown is violet, so that's a little bit blue, but otherwise Gaius stands out a lot in the sea of of red and reddish brown, and I thought having a little bit of bright blue in another place would help.
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Well It's great! I love it!
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Thank you. I'm glad you like it.
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Thank you. I'm glad you like it.
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You're very welcome
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