Character Portrait: Sketches

After sending my (not-so-brief) "brief" to Jason in January, the commission was put on hold for about 3 months, while he worked on a big project. The timing actually worked out well, because those were my months "off" from writing (not to mention the time I was saving up the money by doing research studies) and the very week I regained my momentum and got excited about rewrites - in fact the day after I wrote on my blog that I needed to "reconnect" with my characters - I got an e-mail from Jason saying he was freed up to work on commissions and did I still want to go ahead with the project?

My answer (not in so many words): HELL YEAH!!! *g*

He said he'd get sketches to me a few days later. Sure enough, I got home from church that Sunday and rushed to check my e-mail and there they were! He sent me five:

(All images copyright 2008 Jason Badower.)

My instructions were to ignore expressions and lighting, and look mainly at the pose and relation of the characters. This was strictly to get the "shape" or "form" of the drawing.

I, of course, liked them all. But A seemed a little too...I dunno..."chummy". Not that A&E aren't friends and equals, but - especially given his time period/culture - I just envisioned them in a more formal pose. Same thing, to a degree, with B, though it was closer to what I had envisioned. But the completely side-on pose didn't appeal to me so much.

C and D were essentially the same pose, just with Elspeth looking over different shoulders. I kinda liked C. But something seemed off, and after a while I realized that it relegated Elspeth - even if only slightly - to the role of "damsel". NOT that Alec isn't a dashing, heroic sort. *w* But Elspeth's a strong woman, a black belt and a fighter in her own right,and I wanted that to come across.

E now...E was getting somewhere. In my mind's eye I'd imagined a very similar pose, just reversed and with a few minor changes. I couldn't have described it well (much less drawn it!) without seeing his sketches, but once I had a template (E) to work with, I futzed around with it and came up with this version:

Hoping he wouldn't mind me messing with his artwork, I sent it back to Jason to see if he thought it would work. He said no problem, my version would work great - and he didn't mind because it showed him exactly what I wanted without having to go back-and-forth. We were off and running! Next step: lineart...