Let It Shine ArtShark !!

I had a chance to come up with some new ArtShark art. It's been a long time since I've had fun with the character that's the official mascot for my school. So for educational purposes here's some images that show the process.

This is the original sketch...

Next I darkened the image in Photoshop to isolate the line. Looks strange but it's a necessary step... 

Afterwards I selected the black line and copied it to a dedicated layer. Then I cleaned up the line so there's a pristine image to work with...

Next I added basic color to the composition...

Continuing on to the phase where I color the line to soften things up... 

Then I added a light source and shadows...

Here comes a few finishing touches...

Finally I added text and the school's brand to give the image a theme... and there we have the finished image ready to go!

Fan letter from an art club

Hello folks how are you doing? Yes I'm still here! Been extremely busy as that's pretty much the way things are as of late. No complaints as it's all positive and I have been creatively active. Yet I'm afraid that the overall activity is hampering my ability to stay on top of things communication wise.

That said let's get on to some fun!

This past January while embarking upon the task of moving my school to a new location I received a very nice letter from a group of students in an art club in Richmond Virginia. Here's the letter and the context of what they wrote...

"We are an art club of students from 2 schools covering your work and respect you greatly. We have tried to collect all you have done and admire you most for your versatility and imagination. 

Could you autograph this card for inspiration and others to come? Thanks for teaching us what others have not."

Included was a stamped self addressed envelop with two 5 inch by 3 inch (12.7 x 7.7 centimeters) tabs of paper. So instead of just mailing back my autograph I decided to send a couple of little sketches of Crash and Spyro.

I hope this got to the art club while school is still in session. Thank you guys for your great letter and also for your patience with my reply. Cheers!