Daenerys Targaryen WIP - C+C Welcomed!

**Lii-chan** · July 20th, 2012, 11:17 PM

UPDATE BELOW

This was a quickie I started a few hours ago, that I'd like to finish over the weekend and take with me to Otakon next weekend for my table at AA.

As you can probably (painfully) tell, I would be so grateful for feedback in pretty much all areas of this painting. Specifically the dragon's anatomy. I've been looking at a bunch of refs, but nothing in that exact pose. I am not a creature artist by any means, so I am struggling a bit with this piece of the puzzle, but wanted to give it a go all the same.

Most is WIP stage. Thoughts? Thanks guys!

**Hexokinase** · July 21st, 2012, 01:10 AM

It's got potential. Here's some of my thoughts:

- The girl's pose feels very 'fly-swatted' and flat. I could easily see her laying down on an invisible flat surface, which doesn't feel very compelling with her being free floating and all. Right now every limb feels confined to the XY-plane, and there isn't enough Z-axis action to give the pose some depth.

- The girl's armpits, elbows, and knees need more work. Get a lot of refs, and check out the anatomy books to get those right.

- The hair is very stringy and lacks form. Think about it in terms of painting ribbons rather than strands.

Now, onto that dragon of yours. The best way to proceed is to decide off the bat what visual direction you're aiming for with its design. Look up the works of artists you admire to get those creative juices flowing. Todd Lockwood does some D&D work that's pretty impressive, if that's what you want. Bethesda studios had some nicely designed dragons in skyrim. I'm particularly fond of a lot of the designs found in newer sets of Magic the Gathering. Find something that works, then study it inside and out. Does it have a thick, or serpentine neck? Is it barrel chested, or pear shaped? Does it have a lot of frills and fins, spikes and spines, or none of the above? Is the skull bird-like, or more reptilian? Does it have front limbs, and if so is the dragon bipedal or not?

Once you have all these questions answered, you need to find real life references to inform your execution. Would falcon legs, or lion legs work better for its hind legs? You'll need to study bat wings to get those right. Remember that the bones in the wings are homologous to the bones found in the human arm (same number of joints, etc). You'll have to study pro-level paintings to get a feel on making them dynamic though. It'd help a lot to construct a quick and dirty mock-up with wire and fabric to have an easily accessible reference. The neck needs a lot of work, even if it is meant to be serpentine. Think about the amount of bend possible between each individual vertebrae. Think about where the spine connects into the skull. Think about giving the neck enough room for an esophagus and windpipe.

As you study your refs, you should be making several quick sketches in pencil to make sure everything is working. No use jumping into painting the thing when you haven't fully decided what each individual part of the anatomy should look like.

**Lii-chan** · July 21st, 2012, 01:34 AM

Hexo, awesome crit, thank you so much man! Very helpful

I'm going to look up some of those dragons right now.

I want to keep her free-floating, but I do agree about the XY plane. I wanted the image to have some depth, which I why I chose the dragon's pose the way I did, but I can definitely see where it can be taken to the next level. Thanks for the suggestions! I was just thinking the hair needed more form and less strings, haha.

Thanks again!

**Syle** · July 21st, 2012, 10:19 AM

Hexokinase gave an awesome crit, I only have one thing to add. Right now, as Hexo suggested, it's a bit flat. I only see a middleground and a background. Perhaps you can create some dynamic depth by extending the dragons tail back at the viewer and out of the picture plane to the right or the left? I'm not sure how it would mess with the fluidity of your composition (which is pretty nice right now), but it could potentially enhance the reading of the depth.

Good luck! Cool start. And I really enjoy that color scheme; it hits the eye very nicely.

**Lii-chan** · July 21st, 2012, 02:15 PM

Syle, thank you very much

I really like the idea of adding the tip of the dragons' tail extending into the BG. I'll play around with it a bit and report back. I really need to strengthen my sense of depth in general - I feel like I always paint characters up against a wall. Quality study time is in order I think.

I am glad the colour scheme is working! At first I wasn't sold because I wasn't sure it "fit" Dany, but now I am enjoying working in it a lot

I'll do some more work on a couple of the above suggestions, and then post an update, and a little photo of my studies - Hexo, thanks again! The studies really helped!

**Lii-chan** · July 22nd, 2012, 03:20 AM

UPDATE

I worked on her clothes a bit, and worked on the arm, though the armpit area still needs a lot of work.

Also edited the dragon's body and wing. Though I still feel he's awkward. Any suggestions?

I did a few studies before proceeding last night.

**Hexokinase** · July 22nd, 2012, 05:05 AM

Looking better. Given the position of her arms, it feels as though she's trying to keep her elbows as far apart from eachother as possible. If you bring in her right elbow so that it's pointing towards us, you can keep the hand in pretty much the same location and minimize that bracket feel to the arms.

The dragon is looking better, but the wing's structure can still be pushed further. Keep in mind that all five fingers should branch out of what would be the carpal bones in humans. Here you have the fifth digit very far away, and 2-4 too tightly packed at the base IMO. You've also omitted the elbow joint equivalent. Studying pictures of bat wing skeletons should prove very informative. I've also included a redline that tries to correct these issues, though its not perfect. I tried to have the elbow coming toward the viewer to provide some spherical curvature to the wing's membrane, while staying closely to the original position in you piece. Hope that helps any.

Oh, and if you plan on going with translucent wings here, be sure in indicate the hind legs (assuming it has any).

**Lii-chan** · July 24th, 2012, 03:30 AM

Hexo, thanks so much for the very helpful redline! I worked a bunch more on the dragon, also using some bat wing references. He's not there yet, but maybe better? I think I need to lighten his face, it's much darker than his body.

Didn't touch Dany's arm yet...

**Ysvyri** · July 24th, 2012, 07:21 AM

To me it looks like you're trying super hard to keep that dragon's butt away from the bottom of the image and it makes it look awkward. Maybe see how it looks with letting some of the lower part of his body be off the canvas - would make more sense in terms of proportion too. The dragon's anatomy in general is messy, he doesn't appear to have much underlying construction. The neck, for example, goes thinner near the base and then widens out again, making his neck look flimsy. The muscles for his wing could also be fixed by studying human arm muscles.

Dany's farthest leg bothers me, it appears much too thin and as if it's connected to her pelvis in the wrong place. Her armpit closest to us needs structure too.

**Syle** · July 24th, 2012, 08:02 AM

Originally Posted by Kveldvaahiim

To me it looks like you're trying super hard to keep that dragon's butt away from the bottom of the image and it makes it look awkward. Maybe see how it looks with letting some of the lower part of his body be off the canvas - would make more sense in terms of proportion too. The dragon's anatomy in general is messy, he doesn't appear to have much underlying construction. The neck, for example, goes thinner near the base and then widens out again, making his neck look flimsy. The muscles for his wing could also be fixed by studying human arm muscles.

Dany's farthest leg bothers me, it appears much too thin and as if it's connected to her pelvis in the wrong place. Her armpit closest to us needs structure too.

I agree with both points.

**Lii-chan** · July 24th, 2012, 10:55 AM

Thanks so much, Kveldvaahiim, for the helpful critique. This is my first attempt at a dragon, so I really appreciate your comments and observations.

I originally, for the flow of the piece, wanted to have the dragon curling around like this. However, he does seem to be scrunching into the canvas. I'll try pulling his body down. I also need to add his legs in. I'm a noob when it comes to dragons, haha... I'm feeling the learning curve!

As for Dany, I agree about the arm, and will address it. I'll look into the thigh with the suggestions you made. Thanks again!

**Hexokinase** · July 24th, 2012, 05:59 PM

Definitely seeing improvement with each step

. I agree with Kveld in that studying human anatomy for the wing muscles will help a lot. The tricky part though is getting it not to look too human like.

From a realistic standpoint, its impossible to have something with the bodymass of a typical dragon capable of flight. At least from a design standpoint, I try to compensate that in two ways: extra powerful deltoid, chest, and upperback muscles; and extra large wings. Looking a a bat skeleton, you can see that the forearm equivalent is much longer than the humerus. Reflecting that in the painting can help the wing look less arm-like. I also try to keep the forearm muscles, the biceps and the triceps on the lean side (think bruce lee over schwarzenegger).

In your piece, you need to spend some extra time developing the biceps, the triceps, the deltoid, and the muscles over the scapula (teres major, teres minor, infraspinatus, and the trapezius to an extent).

Regarding the wing's webbing, I'd make the flap along the inside of the elbow more translucent so that it reads clearer. Also note that the main wing membrane should run up into the armpit give or take - you have yours deviating too far onto the chest atm.

**Vermis** · July 24th, 2012, 06:07 PM

Originally Posted by Kveldvaahiim

The dragon's anatomy in general is messy, he doesn't appear to have much underlying construction. The neck, for example, goes thinner near the base and then widens out again, making his neck look flimsy. The muscles for his wing could also be fixed by studying human arm muscles.

It looks like a chubby teardrop with some superficial details skinned over it (the skull, or lack of it, is jumping out at me), and I don't know if the current wing fixes are just more of the same. I think it's a sticking-plaster fix at best, and the whole thing needs to be started again from scratch. With a few looks at lizards, snakes, crocs, dinos, pterosaurs, birds, bats (natch), etc. etc. And jaw muscles. Though watch out if you stumble on reptilevolution.net or Pterosaur Heresies in internet searches, which is likely.

**Ysvyri** · July 25th, 2012, 07:22 AM

I agree with Vermis, also other animals like horses can also be useful to study in their basic forms when it comes to constructing dragons. Horse heads, for example are a great basis for a dragon head.

**zephyri** · July 25th, 2012, 03:31 PM

I agree with the crits you've had on Dany's legs and anatomy in general - so I won't touch on her - but hopefully the lines in these drawing show you how strangely her back legs joins up with her body.

Building on the crit that Hexokinase gave you about the structure of the dragon, I thought these couple of drawings might help you get your head round the basics and how a little anatomy knowledge can help you make the dragon feel solid.

I think you're also maybe still thinking about the dragon as a 2d set of lines, and it might help you to envision it as shapes in perspective more... you have the back of the dragon in view, but the neck still feels like you're seeing it as a side-on shape rather than a thick 3D snake like object that's receding away or toward us. Using simply building blocks as a starting point might help you in future pieces, or if you decide to start the dragon here again.

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