Mermaid Marimo

The mermaid, Aya' and her beloved friend, Mari....the marimo. Swimming together in her fish bowl since 2018~

Hello Everybody~

It is I... NanaWawa.. and here I present a drawing I made as an excuse of me not wanting to clean my room.... I feel like I can never clean my room.... too much distraction....like old drawings making me feel all nostalgic or cringe...both usually...
And at times you just find some stuff that you should throw out but chose to keep instead cause it "inspires" you...

Like this:

An old empty cd envelope that I think I got at a wedding(?).... looking at it really gave me an inspiration. At first, I wanted to draw one of those anime boy/girl trying to reach out to you from behind the glass. You know...like this:

Credits to the original owner of the drawing that I found on pinterest.

But.... I changed my mind and decided to draw a mermaid instead cause

1. The envelope reminds me more of one of those goldfish bowls than a mirror.

2. I am a fantasy/fairytale addict

3. I wanted to brag about MY MARIMO!!!!!

For those who knows me in real life knows that I have been wanting to keep one as a pet since last year...and TA-DA!!

I finally bought one. My first baby marimo!!!

What is a marimo you ask?

Marimos or ball seaweed is a moss ball from japan...and it does nothing but create cute little air bubbles. My dad lowkeys question the stuff that gets me excited.... STAHP JUDGING ME I AM A GROWN INDIEPENDEN WHAMEN!!!!

So yes... I halt cleaning my room in the name of " I have an inspiration and i needz to draw thiz like now" moment and it turns out to be me just being a proud new marimo mom.

BACK TO THE DRAWING PART!!!

I wanted to do traditional instead of digital art. So, first thing first, I measured and cut a piece of watercolor paper to fit the small envelope.

Then I began to sketch which turned out to be the most challenging part of the whole thing. It was hard cause I had to measure where the plastic part of the envelope is located and I also had to make sure the pose is position just right and not go out of frame or something.

Should be just right.

When I was satisfied with the sketch, I clean everything up and start the lineart using watercolor proof ink. Easy enough..

Then the watercoloring starts~

The fun part. I wanted to used the flat wash technique that I learned from my previous post. Added a few details here and there....And of Cos...a touch of gold paint~

here is the final look:

Lastly I added some details on the envelope to make a more complete image....and i'm done~

Well that's it for now~
BYEEE!!!!!!