So basically last night, I was listening to some music, specifically Not Gonna Die by Skillet, more specifically a version on YouTube with the intro (because I’m not the biggest fan of Good to be Alive where the intro actually is). Anyways, when it’s night, my imagination tends to be more active and I tend to have more energy. While listening to the song, I eventually got this mental image in my mind of this scene with Dark Choco, and the more it crystallized the more I wanted to draw it. I was going to go to sleep and maybe do it in the morning, but I realized that I probably would forget the vibe and not have as much energy, so instead I decided to power through and draw the idea
It was a bit difficult since I had limited references for the pose I wanted, and I suppose I can admit the sword looks a bit off anatomically, but it looks good enough I think, and lets me keep the eyes revealed
I did eventually have to stop drawing, because my iPad had been worked all the way down to 4% (and it was at 30% when I started, the poor thing), not to mention it was around 11:30 already which is pretty late for me, and my earbuds had been running nonstop for over 2 hours (yes I was listening to the same song, it’s how I keep the vibe). I was at least able to get the pose, base colors and lineart done, and I’m still pretty proud of where I left things last night
Today was mostly just doing the background and lighting, which admittedly I may have fumbled. I’m not very good at backgrounds and I didn’t know how to draw lightning. I tried my best, but honestly I don’t think I got the image in my head. Didn’t help that my brain was playing the wrong Skillet song this morning
Oh yeah and by the way, the background is supposed to be from this. That’s what I used as reference
The lightning both feels like too much and too little. Like, it’s crowding the picture, and I can’t have more because it’d be way too crowded with it, but also at the same time, it doesn’t feel like enough, like there isn’t as much power as I wanted
Actually wait, maybe I can add some small particle effects to like, enhance the lightning feel. That was in the original sketch but I omitted it in the final. If you see one with that, you know I did that
To be fair though, I don’t think I have the art skill to properly convey the image in my head. Basically the scene is that Dark Choco is using absolutely every amount of his power for this final swing down, so much that it’s too powerful and the Strawberry Jam Sword completely shatters. But also it’s too powerful that Dark Choco’s body simply can’t handle it, and he basically ends up exploding. The scene depicted would be the wind up to that final swing that destroys the both of them
This isn’t necessarily the first time I’ve come up with this scenario, and the setup would basically be that he turned on the Cookies of Darkness slightly earlier, because he didn’t want to destroy his homeland again, and he tried to get rid of them while in the kingdom but not yet at the Citadel, but he ended up failing, so with nothing to lose, he chases after them and decides to put everything into destroying them, even if it likely ends in his death. After this he probably killed Pomegranate and crippled Licorice in some way (I don’t think he’d attack Poison Mushroom), so his final act did have some effect, but he’s still dead by the end of it. And he and his father never got the chance to properly reconcile because Dark Choco thought that could never be a possibility anymore and he had resigned himself to his fate
But yeah, I just don’t know how to convey that sheer overwhelming power and emotion that this scenario suggests. I tried my best though
I also want to submit this to the Dark Cacao Forever contest, but I’m not sure if it’s good enough for it. What do you think?
janainaart
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