Dragons of the Elements - Fire

December, 2010. Watercolor and Ink. 

The Fire Dragon was painted in December 2010 for my Portfolio Development II class at Kingswood Regional High School. It was my first in a series of elemental dragons. It was made using a combination of ink (and pen) and watercolor. To this day, I could not come up with a better name. Naming is just not one of my talents!

I planned out my paintings so that they would all be facing center. Fire on the East, Water on the West, Air from the North, and Earth from the South. In the center is Ether, or Spirit.

I first sketched my subject in pencil (lightly) then painted over it in water color. Once the watercolor was fully dried, I went over it in pen and ink. Unfortunately, I had a lot of difficulty with color bleeding.

I didn't paint the eyes because I thought it looked better (cooler) without pupils. It draws more attention and makes the dragon look more fierce.

This is definitely not one of my favorite paintings. The background leaves much to be desired, and the transparent wings didn't come out as well as I had hoped. Nonetheless, most students thought it was good (if only for the inkwork).

(c) Maranda L. Scott