Ahoy-hoy. This week I'm going to be posting a series I did for EchoOtter's Twitch and Twitter pages. The core idea was to have his mascot--a playful otter, of course--wearing different hats to coincide with whatever game he might be playing at the time, so what better hat to kick us off with here than one from the project's guiding aesthetic? Thusly, here's our friendly neighborhood otter sporting a Link hat.
And here is our default otter, who will be the wearer of various hats this week. We based the entire series look on the Windwaker style, which was a real treat, as you get to have really chunky and "primal" lines to work with. Not to mention, Zelda holds a special place in my heart: Ocarina of Time was huge to me as a kid--I'd study and draw art from the game manual for that and Majora's Mask, plus their coverage in Nintendo Power more than any other series.
I also liked that I got to use one of my absolute favorite paper textures, which I've had since college, I believe. You just find some nice, crinkled paper that sings, scan it up, and you've got a trusty ally at your side. This one has so much character to it, I knew it'd be a great fit. This is what our piece looks like with just plain, ol' base colors, though--no texture!
Again, thanks to the "primal" vibes of our source material, coloring was also nice and straightforward. Windwaker style has precious little detail or noodley workings, so it's liberating just to have a few colors you need to stress about and then you just go with them, not too much space to lose yourself in second-guesses.
It was quite fortunate that the coloring wasn't too intensive, actually, because right as I was preparing for this piece, my chairback started falling apart, so while I had been trying to make do, I had severe back and neck pain from the new sitting arrangement I had improvised. I've been in a similar situation before, and if your body starts hurting like that, you just have to stop--do not try to slug through it, it's not worth it.
We eventually made it through and everyone lived happily ever after, but what a little adventure this series was. Happy memories of desperately doodling after old game key art, horrific memories of suffering through old injuries, tons of adorable otter pictures googled for reference--this project had it all. Anyway, more art from this run to come throughout the week.
Not normal,
Reuxben
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