FanArt_ink.Graceful

MTGinktober pirouettes into Day 17, "Graceful," starring Graceful Adept enjoying a little sushi and getting in her daily balance exercises for maximum gains in gracefulness!

So here we have Grace on a break to grab some grub, while still staying adeptly graceful in her cranial, manual, and knee-based balancing capacities. I did feel a little cheap using a card that has the prompt in the name, but the card's art was just so cool and the image has stuck with me for all these years since Kamigawa block.

I've always thought this was some extremely cool art for such a weirdly random card--though it's Scott M. Fischer, so it's got to rock--but while drawing this, as is often the case, I got to find even deeper appreciation for the piece. I had to contend with details I never noticed before--she has these sorta drama-mask knee guards and bells on clothes and in her hair! And while I didn't capture it in my rendition, the wavy patterns on her outfit are actually metallic and sit above the fabric!

Fun Facts: This piece started a lot more interesting, but we had to cut the second figure for time. Our supporting character was going to be a Prophet of Kruphix grooving out in the back. I wasn't sure what she her secondary gag was going to be though, maybe balancing some coffee or something to keep in the mood of being on a snack break. But getting the arms and hands right times four or six was going to take too long, so as much as I haaaaaated it, we took an eraser to her. One of the biggest bummers this month. Since I didn't want to leave Grace completely in a void of space, I had her just sorta relaxing near the falls, somewhat inspired by Dreamcatcher.

Easter Eggs: Another super last-minute addition, Keiga, the Tide Star is just visible over the Martina Pilcerova Kamigawa Island-inspired waterfall, and is our second Kamigawa dragon to join the fray after a wild Kokusho appeared in "Long." Grace is sitting on the Shell of the Last Kappa! She is balancing on her finger a Vial of Dragonfire brand soy sauce. Since this was such a JP-centric piece, I decided to do all my signing info in Japanese, including the date.

Halfway between a Fun Fact and an Easter Egg, if you look closely at the skirt back, I was so tired while tuning this one up for the site that I dozed off for a split second while rendering the texture just above the hip! Neat lines suddenly skip into dreamy nightmare land...coulda been way worse, but lesson learned: do not ink, especially detaily stuff, while drowsy.

Not normal,

Reuxben