Steemians Art Gift #1 | @hungry-griffin chibi fanart

Hi everyone! 🌸 I'm MissSJ, a 23-year-old Psychology graduate from the Philippines who loves digital art. Today, I want to show you how I create my digital drawings. Let's get started! This is my art gift to sir @hungry-griffin, i will be gifting random steemians an art until the end of the year, so just drop your comments below to receive yours, but it will not be instant okay?

Step 1: The First Sketch 🖌️

I begin with a basic outline. I use my digital drawing tablet to sketch the main shapes and structure of my character. For this piece, I've drawn a cute griffin – a mythical beast that's half lion half eagle. The sketch looks basic, but it helps me place everything . It's okay if it's untidy at this point; I focus on getting the sizes right.

Step 2: Making the Lines Better ✏️

After the first sketch, I make a new layer for the improved line art. Here, I trace over the sketch with neater more purposeful lines. I use a smaller brush to add details making sure the lines are smooth and clear. This step brings the character to life. You can see the griffin taking form with its adorable paws and fluffy feathers. 🥰

Step 3: Adding Base Colors

Now that the line art is complete, on to coloring! I make a new layer under the Line Art one, and fill in my base colors. This particular griffin gets a warm orange for his body and soft cream for the feathers. Remember to keep the colors really, really flat here—shading and highlights will come later. The key is just to make sure the colors are inside the lines, and it will look nice and clean.

Step 4: Shading and Highlights ✨

The fun part—shading and highlighting! Add some depth to the griffin with shadows and light. It brings the character into life in a great way. I take a little darker shade of the base color and add shadows in areas like under the wings and around the paws. Next, with a lighter shade, I give highlights on top of the head, wings, and other parts that seem to catch light. This will make the griffin three-dimensional by gradating the tones.

Step 5: Final Touches and Details

After shading comes the fine details, and that is adding texture to the feathers and detailing the eyes to make them shine. Also, I fluff up the fur of the griffin a bit and add some soft blush to the cheeks for cuteness. All of these little details make big differences in the look of the artwork.

Step 6: Background and text

Now I finalize the background and ancillary text. For this griffin, I had a clear sky blue with some text that says, in a bold, playful font, "HUNGRY-GRIFFIN." This helps a lot to put the character in his space but can be used to decorate the overall look of the piece. Be sure the colors of the background complement the griffin without overpowering it.

Conclusion

And there you have it—my step-by-step process of making digital art. Drawing in a digital way gives me the opportunity to express myself in so many ways, and I am falling in love with sharing my journey of art. Keep in mind that practice makes perfect, so keep doodling and experimenting in your style.Thanks for joining me on this creative adventure! If you enjoyed this walkthrough, be sure to follow me for more art tips and tricks. Until next time, keep creating and stay inspired! 💖