Fan art: Aziraphale and Crowley
Jun. 24th, 2014 12:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tilly_stratfordWhoa, two pieces of fan art in one month? This is unprecedented! It's all thanks to that Tumblr palette challenge making the rounds.
I've mentioned before I'm really bad at visualizing characters from non-visual media. It's only through drawing fan art I actually sit down and have a good think about how I'd like the characters to look. That said, I've adored Good Omens for nigh on a decade now and I have never ever tried drawing fan art of it before, go figure.
Revisiting Good Omens, you know it's fascinating how little the book tells us about Aziraphale and Crowley's appearances. Sure it says Crowley has black hair, yellow slitted eyes and "good cheekbones", but nowhere does it say Aziraphale is blonde, that's just popular fanon. There's exactly one instance where the angel's hands are described as "plump" though, a lot of people seem to miss that.
It took some figuring out, but eventually I decided I liked the idea of Crowley still having a bit of the serpent in him, I wanted his face and posture to suggest that. For reference I used Jude Law back when he looked a bit lean and hungry and angular. For Aziraphale I imagined an angel whose lifestyle had caught up with him -- wine, good food and serenity -- so I wanted a soft face, some chubbiness and hair that's grown a little bit long and unruly. For inspiration I used Joseph Cotten and -- I'm not kidding -- James May. It pained me a little to draw Crowley without his trademark sunglasses (or Aziraphale without some reading glasses) but they obscured too much.
I'm very happy with Crowley, though looking at it now he's a got a bit of a Biker Dracula look going. As for Aziraphale I still haven't cracked that code for curly hair, but after redrawing his hair for the 15648th time I decided "Ah fuck it" and let it be.
I thought working from a pre-chosen colour palette would make the drawing process easier, because I'm really bad at colours. But then turns out, I'm still really bad at colours and with a limited palette I suddenly have to think about readability and contrast and ugh. So it's not a very creative composition but I genuinely had a lot of fun making it.
I've mentioned before I'm really bad at visualizing characters from non-visual media. It's only through drawing fan art I actually sit down and have a good think about how I'd like the characters to look. That said, I've adored Good Omens for nigh on a decade now and I have never ever tried drawing fan art of it before, go figure.
Revisiting Good Omens, you know it's fascinating how little the book tells us about Aziraphale and Crowley's appearances. Sure it says Crowley has black hair, yellow slitted eyes and "good cheekbones", but nowhere does it say Aziraphale is blonde, that's just popular fanon. There's exactly one instance where the angel's hands are described as "plump" though, a lot of people seem to miss that.
It took some figuring out, but eventually I decided I liked the idea of Crowley still having a bit of the serpent in him, I wanted his face and posture to suggest that. For reference I used Jude Law back when he looked a bit lean and hungry and angular. For Aziraphale I imagined an angel whose lifestyle had caught up with him -- wine, good food and serenity -- so I wanted a soft face, some chubbiness and hair that's grown a little bit long and unruly. For inspiration I used Joseph Cotten and -- I'm not kidding -- James May. It pained me a little to draw Crowley without his trademark sunglasses (or Aziraphale without some reading glasses) but they obscured too much.
I'm very happy with Crowley, though looking at it now he's a got a bit of a Biker Dracula look going. As for Aziraphale I still haven't cracked that code for curly hair, but after redrawing his hair for the 15648th time I decided "Ah fuck it" and let it be.
I thought working from a pre-chosen colour palette would make the drawing process easier, because I'm really bad at colours. But then turns out, I'm still really bad at colours and with a limited palette I suddenly have to think about readability and contrast and ugh. So it's not a very creative composition but I genuinely had a lot of fun making it.
