"Captains Quarters"

If you follow my Instagram, you've already seen this illustration! If you'd like to learn more about it, read ahead <3.

These are two characters that will be featured in my comic one day! The bird's name is Sombra, and the man's name is Alfor. Alfor is a chief to a sort of revolution-type group - although I won't tell you much about this so as to not spoil my own story.

In his free time, Alfor enjoys painting abstract and hyper-realistic paintings, as does Sombra enjoy watching the sun elf paint. Soon, I have an animatic that features these two I'll be posting to YouTube.

I was actually on a cruise when I finished this illustration! I was given the opportunity to show it to one of the workers in the art gallery, who quickly informed me that my art looked amazing and worthy of ending up on the walls with their other featured artists. When I tell you this is the best compliment I've ever gotten, I sure mean it! After all I've been through in the past three years, being told these things was such a relief. I was shaking I was so happy to hear such a thing. If you ever think your work isn't worthy - look at the more recent pieces being featured in art galleries. Most are abstract, the usual - but your characters you've designed, hyper-realistic or not - somewhere, somewhere, your artwork is more than worthy to be there. It will very likely be years before I even highly consider submitting my own artwork to places like that - but it makes me very glad to know that it's an option for me. I encourage you, no matter your profession - to push yourself outside of your comfort zone. Sometimes, it will be very hard to get things right over time - other times, you just might surprise yourself.