I participated in the TMNT Pit’s Secret Santa this year! This art was made for @ninjastar-ace
The prompt was: Raph getting decorated like a Christmas tree by one or more of his brothers
And initially I wasn’t 100% sure iteration this was indicating, and had a brain fart moment forgetting there was a way to ask questions without ruining the surprises, but I figured “yes Rise Raph is tall as a tree, but also 03 Raph got a growth spurt as was taller than the others at the end of the series.” And thus, the prompt developed the additional detail of being a contest between two iterations.
This took more than 10 hours to complete, and mostly because this was the first time I drew the 2003 turtles in a serious manner. (Doodling for daycare kids at work in 2014 doesn’t count cause it wasn’t serious.)
At the end of it all, I wanted to make sure they were at least recognizable and posing in a way that felt believable. 03 Leo was originally questioning whether it was cheating that Raph had more space for ornaments, and the decorations were going to be a lot more extravagant, but I was running out of time and squeezed the Christmas part of the picture in the last two hours. I certainly had a lot of fun, even when I was holding my head wondering what I got myself into. Looking forward to next years celebration!