Black Panther - My Digital Drawing + Movie Facts

  Superheroes movies and shows, were and will always be my obsession! And as an African, I finally get to have a representation in the superheroes big movies world!

Black Panther development started as early as 1992 when Wesley Snipes announced his intention to make the film, but it wasn't until October 2014 when Kevin Feige Marvel's President, made the announcement that the movie would finally get to the screen with Chadwick Boseman as the title role, and four years after that, here we are in February 2018, the movie was finally released.

According to the writer Joe Robert Cole, the film is a historic opportunity to depict a black superhero, and it was important to root the themes of the film in the actual cultures of Africa, by working with experts in the region, which will help make things in the movie as accurate as possible.

"Black Panther" already shattered a lot of records worldwide, a phenomenon says Box Office charters, it is now the highest grossing film in history by a black director featuring a black cast.

While I'm waiting to see the movie, I decided to draw the African superhero, and honestly just the thought of it brought me so much excitement, it felt good when I was imagining the construction of the drawing and I’m really happy I finally got to create it.
The environment I've chosen for the character is a full moon cloudy sky, cold and foggy in the heart of an ancient golden city, where he is standing next to a pyramid while the Black Panther is guarding his territory.

I had to check several references to draw the black panther suite design.
After drawing the line work for the character, the next stage is painting.
I break down the painting process into 4 steps, the first step is the Colors Setup where I start filling the character line work with basic flat colors, then the second step is Paint Blocking, this is where I start building the tones by roughly adding the shadows and highlights to each basic flat colors.

The third step is Blending, here I soften and smooth the transitions between the shadows and highlights, to create smooth color gradients.
And the final step is Details and Refinement, where I add more details to the painting when needed, bring up more highlights or shadows, add and play with some textures and overlays, in order to create a finished image. Finally, I use the same painting process for the background.

Here's a timelapse on Dtube showing the painting process, with some African rhythms to enjoy!

 

 

I hope you like it, I'm still a digital art newbie, so any tips or criticism comments will be much appreciated! Thanks for reading.

Q: Did you watch the movie?