From Words to Picture to Reality

I'm currently working on a random story for the How To Train Your Dragon archives on fanfiction. Ordinarily I don't doodle my characters, but I was having so much fun creating Katyenka, a Cossack 'Rider of Kiev', (instead of a Rider of Berk. Ha!) that I had to draw her!


Katyenka and Zakhar, my two Original Characters from the How to Train Your Dragon story. Does Zakhar look somewhat familiar? ;) He should, he's based off of Bodie.
Well, I couldn't just stop there. No way! Now I had to do another picture, this time with Hiccup and Toothless in it. So back to the drawing board I went.

Katyenka and Zakhar, Hiccup and Toothless.
I'm not quite so good at dragons, but I thought I did an okay job for a first timer. :)
Katyenka is a Cossack, a Slavic freedom fighter from a long time ago in Russia/Ukraine. They're actually quite a fascinating group of people, I love studying their culture. As you can see from both pictures, Katyenka is dressed in traditional Cossack outfit. It was so much fun to design! The Cossacks were fantastic riders (did you know they created trick riding? The moves are contributed to them, though they actually borrowed some of them from the Mongolians) hence the reason I gave her a Pegasus for the story. Since vikings ride dragons in How to Train Your Dragon, why can't Cossacks ride Pegasuses?
The wonders of fiction.

Then of course, I couldn't just stop there. Nope!
Now I just had to make an outfit.

Me in a Cossack outfit!
Tada! I had so much fun making this, though it was way too hot for the climate right now. When fall comes, I plan on doing a photo-shoot with Bodie while wearing this outfit. It will be so much fun! I based it off of traditional Cossack outfits, but I made it a bit more simpler. While the dancing Cossacks you see in the movies (you know, the dancing, singing Russians? Most of them are actually Cossacks, who created the famous dance where you get really low and kick out your legs. You should watch a video of it sometime, it's amazing.) wear much fancier outfits, I went for a more Fiddler on the Roof style, or a fifteen hundreds Cossack style. I felt like a real Kayenka!

So that's how one goes from doing a story, to art and then to dressing up as your own character. Believe me, if you're anything like me... you're doomed. Reality and imagination will eventually mix, you can count on that!

Oh, one more thing. I like to draw My Little Ponies. >:-)
Hmm, all these ponies are from the show... except the one with the TT cutie mark. I wonder who that could be? Perhaps a certain Quarter Horse in my backyard. ;)
I guess you don't have to be an artist to enjoy art!

What side hobbies do you enjoy? I'd love to hear them!

-Emily

Comments

  1. Well, I must say...you draw WAY better than I do! :P I'm a terrible drawer. ;) This is kind of disappointing to me, because I would have LOVED to be able to illustrate my own books...*sighs*. Anyways, I write stories as a hobby, and make jewelry for friends and family.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well, considering I'm from a family of very professional artists, I don't really feel like I'm all that great. :) I was happy with how my pictures came out, though.
      I know, right? I wish I could illustrate my own stories too, but more often than not my characters don't come out right. Which is really too bad, I wish they'd come out better. I do have sisters who do it for me though, so it works out.
      I have another sister who loves to make jewelry! She's really good at it. Do you post pictures of your jewelry on your blog? I'd love to see some of it!

      Delete
  2. Do you enjoy drawing? Hmm, professional artists in your family? Can you post some pics of some of their pics? You are really good.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, I should post some pictures of their art! My sister M. did the illustrations for Susan Marlow's Goldtown Adventure books. She's also the illustrator for the Winning Stories book that Susan published and for the Circle C Short Stories. You can see her art in all of those. :) But I'll post some!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Thanks for reading my blog, and I hope you enjoyed this post! If you have any comments or thoughts you'd like to share I'd love to hear from you! But do be thoughtful of others and please, no swearing or badmouthing, or I'll have to delete the comment. Thank you!

Popular posts from this blog

It's About Time...For an Update!

Polyushko Polye: A Song With a History

Devoted