Martha’s Gift – Elves and Food

For Martha’s birthday I drew us as Elves, an image that’s long run between us due to our love of LOTR and exchanging simple baked goods.

With as simple a background as possible, I really wanted to get across the leafy, green and orange, autumnal feel. I’ve always associated Martha with these colours.

I think this piece is really successful. There’s a density to the air that suggests sunlight on dust, and life. I focused really hard on keeping tonal plains simple and pleasant, so that when I threw colour on, it was still readable as an image.

The tree and poses are referenced but I chose them because the tree branching into the foreground gives a great sense of depth and creates a scene the characters sit within.

She’s in Japan right now, and I miss her.