Angel

This was my entry for the AM fanart contest and it brought me 2nd place (only 4 points away from the "The Art of Angel Sanctuary" artbook which was the prize for first place... I'll just have to try harder next time)

Yes, it's a bit abstract and it has to do with continuity and rebirth. I got some pretty funny comments on it too. A lot of people said they didn't understand the idea and one said he took away points because the girl had no butt <.< I laughed my ass off at that comment XD

Other comments regarded the lineart. It came out a bit shaky because all of it was done with a gel pen and it's pretty difficult to make a long, straight or curved continuous line with one of those >.< Also, ALL that black was painstakingly colored with a gel pen in tiny bits and it pretty much drove me crazy.

A lot of time was spent with references. References for the wings (I ended up using aigrette wings since they were the most graceful I could find), how they look spread, how they fold, shape of feathers, etc, for the ripples (how to make 3D ripples using black and white... kinda gave up on that) and for butterflies (I'm not that big of a fan of butterflies so I had to look some up ... I loved some swallow tail ones though and I used their wing shape)...

Another part which kinda gave me trouble were her breast... Yeah... At first, I forgot her position and I drew them as though her position would have been a vertical one and when I looked at her... well.. it just looked wrong. And the wings... oh, the damn wings... I think I had to redo the sketch 5 or so times until I got the wings right...

Nobody noticed the fact that the spiral is not a spiral from the beginning though. It forms ripples at first, that, as they expand, start forming a spiral ^^ Weee!

Anyway, as painful an experience as this was, it was also fun! A lot of the other drawings were really nice as well and all in all, I think it was one of the best contests I entered ^^

Hope you like this one and fell free to color it if you, sometime, have nothing better to do