After submitting almost a years worth of very very dark images and finding myself stuck in an inspiration malaise I decided to go back and try doing a dragon in a brightly lit scene. This is almost a first for me really to do something this bright and colourful and not hide details in huge black areas.

I usually do dark images because it hides the imperfections in my abilities to do photorealistic subjects. But this time I wanted to ignore my limitations and go hell for leather and ignore the lack of photorealism and just go for it.

Painted from scratch in photoshop across 2 days using a wacom tablet.

Walthrough to follow.

This image is dedicated to someone who is going through a really tough time right now and I want them to believe they can survive and that some day soon they will be chasing butterflies again.