Draw This in Your Style Challenge: A Fanart of Annie Stegg’s Princess Cordelia

I have a confession to make…

I haven’t completed a single full illustration in 2018.

I know, I know! And I call myself an artist. 😅

I have a few WIPs, but it wasn’t a topmost priority, and then life just got in the way.

So when 2019 came, you bet I was feeling internal shame.

In the midst of wallowing in my feelings of incompetence, I saw Annie Stegg‘s #annieartchallenge on Instagram…

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Annie Stegg Gerard (@anniestegg)

She’s a real pro in creating whimsical paintings, and I will admit she has influenced me greatly in my creative journey as a fantasy illustrator. I’ve been a fan of her works since I discovered her art back in deviantART days.

Her online challenge was screaming JOIN at me.

And it was the perfect art exercise because of three things:

1. As it was a portrait image, it was simple enough that I know it won’t take me forever to accomplish. Just the perfect subject for practice.
2. With a beautiful reference artwork already laid out for me, I wouldn’t have to stress myself over putting together references and refining my concept. I only have to “copy” as I redo it in my own style. With conceptualization out of the way, I can focus all my efforts on exploring my illustration style and nothing else.
3. It’s an online challenge meant to be done for fun. No pressure in making it look consistent with my other works because it’s not going in my original art portfolio.

With that said, I went to work and still finished it on the very last day. 😂  (Philippine time!!!)

But it was totally worth it. I felt so accomplished and I really enjoyed the challenge of making it my own while staying true to the original illustration.

Here is the finished piece:

I chose to draw the lines in Photoshop instead of the usual super clean vectors in Illustrator that I’ve worked with for the past couple of years. I guess I wanted to see which digital inking process would feel more natural to me.

Illustrator is perfect for OCD line artists like me, but giving the sharp lines a natural flow is also taking up too much of my time; I am starting to wonder if maybe just letting the pen pressure decide the line’s appearance/thickness and direction would serve me better.

After this exercise, I was definitely convinced that it is less time-consuming, so we’ll see about that in my future illustrations.

Here is a closer look:

The original Instagram post can be found on this link.

What do you think of my rendition?