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[Final Edit] - June 2
Alright, I admit. This is one of the artwork that I never get the hair right until these days. Previously I was convinced her hair should be that way (erm... if you got the old pic to refer), but days after days of looking.. I realize that logically the hair is somewhat wrong. So, when my hand starts itchy again, I decided to redraw the hair entirely to see whether the luck returns. And voila, as much I expected, finally I have made the hair resemblance exactly like lightning! Also, I have change the color scheme... Instead of too vividly colored, I adjust in a way the color looks more natural to reality with some bright lighting. Hope ya like it!

[Edit 1]
Yeah, hand itchiness strikes back! Basically the edits here are quite major that I adjust most of the upper limb parts including her hair, face and skin shading and lighting. Especially the hair part, I have to refer again... this time with in the FFXIII game itself and the playart (back then when I submitted the art, I still haven't got them yet)

As for the overall lighting, I actually adjusted to make the environment more realistic in terms of lighting.

[Edit 2]
Argh, I realized I ruined the color in Edit 1. Apologies for the 2nd update. This time the color is done correctly

Finally!!! After 2 months plus of struggle, the artwork is complete!

As you can see, what really took me extremely lots of time is the amount of details I have to put into this artwork. Everything from herself to the background are made from scratch. (Yeah, even the Cocoon behind her too )

If you want to know what really took me so long to complete, here's my explanation:-

Her Hair:
Yup, she had the most complicated hair I ever drew! Her hair may be looked easy if draw her standing. But when comes to that pose (side tilting her head), I would need to imagine how would her hair looked like when falling sideways. I got this challenge: How would I make her hair falling naturally while still maintaining her hair shape? And to solve this challenge, it took me lots of redraw over and over again (probably 5-6 times? )

Her Face & Body:
My style for every similar of this artwork, I usually draw her face and entire body before put on the clothes. Since I don't really like my model to be out of proportion, I used grid technique and from there, I sketch the outline accordingly to the face shape, mouth, nose etc.

Her Outfit:
Yay, the most time consuming and almost drive me crazy! Every single parts (Jacket, belts, zippers, buttons, treads, accessories etc) are drawn on separate layers. And that one layer may be separated to a few sub-layers. To make them looked 3D, I usually use Path tool to shape them out before I put in details (shadow & lighting) with brushes. It's similar on how 3D software works whereby you need to construct the wireframes, just that don't have auto generated shadows and you can't rotate around in 3-Dimension LOL.

The Background:
Surprisingly, the background wasn't really a time consuming. Even though you see the background was in focus blur, I actually did draw the background in details first like separately draw Cocoon, draw the mountain with textures and put in details for the plant before blurring it.

There are more to tell for the journey I have venture through, but guess that once finish, it's finish! I hope this artwork is really worth consuming the time and I hope you guys liking it! Enjoy!

[Update -27 August 09]
Some adjustment on lighting and shadows.

Material Used:
Adobe Photoshop CS3
Wacom Graphire 4

Reference:
- Saaya Irie - Japanese Bikini Model (Yeah, the same model I did for Haruhi Suzumiya).
- Several screenshots and wallpapers featuring Lightning released by Square Enix, game magazines etc

Character Design: Tetsuya Nomura © SQUARE ENIX CO. LTD

Description
Download for Full View Details

[Final Edit] - June 2
Alright, I admit. This is one of the artwork that I never get the hair right until these days. Previously I was convinced her hair should be that way (erm... if you got the old pic to refer), but days after days of looking.. I realize that logically the hair is somewhat wrong. So, when my hand starts itchy again, I decided to redraw the hair entirely to see whether the luck returns. And voila, as much I expected, finally I have made the hair resemblance exactly like lightning! Also, I have change the color scheme... Instead of too vividly colored, I adjust in a way the color looks more natural to reality with some bright lighting. Hope ya like it!

[Edit 1]
Yeah, hand itchiness strikes back! Basically the edits here are quite major that I adjust most of the upper limb parts including her hair, face and skin shading and lighting. Especially the hair part, I have to refer again... this time with in the FFXIII game itself and the playart (back then when I submitted the art, I still haven't got them yet)

As for the overall lighting, I actually adjusted to make the environment more realistic in terms of lighting.

[Edit 2]
Argh, I realized I ruined the color in Edit 1. Apologies for the 2nd update. This time the color is done correctly

Finally!!! After 2 months plus of struggle, the artwork is complete!

As you can see, what really took me extremely lots of time is the amount of details I have to put into this artwork. Everything from herself to the background are made from scratch. (Yeah, even the Cocoon behind her too )

If you want to know what really took me so long to complete, here's my explanation:-

Her Hair:
Yup, she had the most complicated hair I ever drew! Her hair may be looked easy if draw her standing. But when comes to that pose (side tilting her head), I would need to imagine how would her hair looked like when falling sideways. I got this challenge: How would I make her hair falling naturally while still maintaining her hair shape? And to solve this challenge, it took me lots of redraw over and over again (probably 5-6 times? )

Her Face & Body:
My style for every similar of this artwork, I usually draw her face and entire body before put on the clothes. Since I don't really like my model to be out of proportion, I used grid technique and from there, I sketch the outline accordingly to the face shape, mouth, nose etc.

Her Outfit:
Yay, the most time consuming and almost drive me crazy! Every single parts (Jacket, belts, zippers, buttons, treads, accessories etc) are drawn on separate layers. And that one layer may be separated to a few sub-layers. To make them looked 3D, I usually use Path tool to shape them out before I put in details (shadow & lighting) with brushes. It's similar on how 3D software works whereby you need to construct the wireframes, just that don't have auto generated shadows and you can't rotate around in 3-Dimension LOL.

The Background:
Surprisingly, the background wasn't really a time consuming. Even though you see the background was in focus blur, I actually did draw the background in details first like separately draw Cocoon, draw the mountain with textures and put in details for the plant before blurring it.

There are more to tell for the journey I have venture through, but guess that once finish, it's finish! I hope this artwork is really worth consuming the time and I hope you guys liking it! Enjoy!

[Update -27 August 09]
Some adjustment on lighting and shadows.

Material Used:
Adobe Photoshop CS3
Wacom Graphire 4

Reference:
- Saaya Irie - Japanese Bikini Model (Yeah, the same model I did for Haruhi Suzumiya).
- Several screenshots and wallpapers featuring Lightning released by Square Enix, game magazines etc

Character Design: Tetsuya Nomura © SQUARE ENIX CO. LTD