Attack on Titan (with progression shots)

I took a nice, LONG break from drawing. . . with Sakura-Con and the wedding, I was going crazy creating art stuff and got a bit burned out. I needed a rest.

But I've recovered now and have picked up my pencil to start drawing again ;-)

When I started drawing this piece, I decided I wanted to document its progression. I don't know about anyone else, but as an artist I am fascinated by the process of art. Even when I'm the one making it!

So here we go:

First layout out the shapes and lines. Everything is pretty rough at this point, but it's a matter of figuring out what I like and what I don't like to evolve proportions as the piece progresses. 

I've cleaned up some lines and fixed some things I felt were weak or incorrect in the initial sketch. My lines are starting to get stronger.

There's some odd shading I'm going to attempt, so here I'm penciling in some of the areas I'm not sure about to see how the ideas I have will look. I'm also starting to bold some of the important outlines.

Focused on bolding lines and building more shading shapes. I'm also starting to test some different shapes for the background elements.

More bolding, more shading.

The shading part takes a lot of time. . .

Building up some darker values.

Finished pencil piece. This piece isn't intended to be a finished piece in and of itself - there are things purposely left imperfect or unfinished because I know they'll be resolved when I digitally color the image.

This piece is based on a scene in the anime "Attack on Titan" - one of the grittiest, creepiest animes I've ever watched. It also has some of the most intense moments I've enjoyed in an anime series, including the one I drew here. This is the main character, Eren, sacrificing himself to save the life of his childhood friend. He's actually in the mouth of a giant monster, about to be swallowed. In the anime this moment is always shown from a side angle - never straight on like this. Yet, when I picture the scene in my head, this is what I see.

Hope you enjoyed looking at the steps that brought this piece to life!

~m.d.