So.
I meant to do this step-by-step tutorial with a picture at each step, to illustrate the step and show the progress I've made as I go, but I got swept up in the art of the moment and realized by the time I got to the end, I had just the one picture. I forgot to save my stages.
I thought about trying to do it step-by-step backwards, which I could easily have done, but it seemed dishonest somehow. So I thought, "fuck it." I can remember all the steps quite easily, and since the result is right there in front of you – easy enough for you to imagine along (or for you ambitious students, to follow along with the lesson yourself in MS Paint, Paintbrush, wax crayon on paper, pastels or what have you. LINK TO YOUR OWN ATTEMPT, in comments!).
Step 1. "Here there be DRAGONS." Always put your caption on first. A bold statement of purpose, to guide your muse as you go. Note what I did here: first I typed the text out, then I cut and dragged the word DRAGONS to the bottom. This creates suspense for the caption-reader, and provides a natural framing device for the drama that unfurls in the space between the words.
Step 2. The head. As you can see, I went to town on that head. But what might not be immediately apparent is, for my first pass at the head, I "roughed it in" with some lines, drawing and redrawing – eventually when I settled on a design and contours that I liked, I "traced over" those lines in a different color, and erased the rest.
Step 3. The body. Similar to how I went about the head. I first drew many, many "roughed in" contour lines describing the sinuous curves of the beast's serpentine form. Then I added rounded contour lines, to round the contours of the body and give the impression of volume. Finally I added wings and limbs. Note only one limb is visible – this is a touch of almost magical realism, it creates the illusion that the other limb is out of sight on the other side of the beast's body. Psychologically, this little trompe l'oeil touch makes the dragon seem almost enormous in the viewer's mind.
Step 4. Color. This part was easy. After I decided on that dark blue for the background, though, I ended up changing the color of the caption to red to make it really "pop."
Step 5. Fire!! I painted the pink streaky-like-lightning lines of the dragon's fire-breathe, and then – in the single most complicated step – I 'cut' the entire image leaving only the blue background, "roughed" in some yellow flame-blast to underlie the pink streaks, and 'pasted' the foreground image back on top! The 'background color transparent' option made it all possible. As you can see, the yellow blast is a bit high. It was hard to gauge without the foreground image as a guide. But I think it ends up looking better that way, arguably. It looks more explosively ferocious.
Step 6. Finishing details! I went back to the head and added horns, those stark "outlineless" white snagglefangs, nostrils, and – most ghastly of all – glaring jet black eyes with piercing red pupils and rims. I actually screwed up with a bucket fill and I couldn't turn the whites of the eyes back to white without turning the whole dragon white. So I left the whites of the eyes black, and what we're left with is this stunning effect. Those eyes turn my blood cold.
Perhaps the most important lesson can sometimes be a mistake!
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