Digital Art - Self portrait and Princess Ozma of Oz

         I have been hard at work as of late on my webcomic, which you'll all get a chance to read once I'm ready to start posting it online somewhere. I have had my art tablet since January, and although I've been drawing via paper and pencil or pen for years, the leap to digital art was kind of like having to relearn how to draw all over again. but I've come a long way.

        Many cartoonists who have their own little Facebook page do cartoon self-portraits of themselves as an avatar. I had been meaning to update my profile picture for a long time. For the longest time it was a picture of me in Armenia, at Noravank monastery specifically. This worked when I set the page up to promote my self-published novel Odinochka in 2016, but I have different artistic goals now and needed to rebrand, as it were. A few months ago I renamed the page to Suren's Art and Prose. And now I have finally drawn my avatar. 

        This is based on my general look from age 15 to 21-ish, when I always wore a leather hat and black hoodie. It's my classic attire. I started varying what I wore in my early 20's but I still dress this way when it's actually cold enough in Florida for me to do so (so like one month out of the year). As I wrote in the Facebook post introducing it, I feel weird drawing myself. I often feel like I'm the opposite of a narcissist, I don't always like seeing my own reflection and I dislike hearing my own voice in a recording. But I must have it in me somewhere I suppose. Even though I don't really look this young anymore in real life, this is how I feel inside.  I'll always see myself as how I looked as a teen when I picture myself, no matter how I age.  

        Anyway, I had another art piece I wanted to debut today. Fans of the Oz series would know that today is the birthday of Princess Ozma, the ruler of Oz. In an effort to practice coloring and shading I took a John R. Neill illustration and did a colored version. It may have been a trace job (which I feel is best to admit upfront) but it was still no easy feat. I think I became a better artist for having done it. So here is my birthday gift to the ruler of Oz. Maybe she'll let me live in Oz now...

        Here is our stunning fairy princess, standing in front of the (book-accurate) Emerald City. I actually don't plan on doing too much shading in my webcomic, just as an artistic choice, but I felt that I should at least know how to do it. And I can now if I have to. The illustration I used in the pencil layer was my favorite Ozma picture by John R. Neill:

            So you see the shoulders and chest were all me, at least. And I picked the colors out myself. It took me about three days on and off to do the whole thing, using lots of layering.