Darkened Spirit, Purest Heart - Faestock

Submission to Ms. Jessica Truscott's First December Contest.
Based of a single stock image of her portrait, I divided the page between light and dark.

***Its kinda late and I have to be up tomorrow morning.
I'll give ya'll a proper description, setup and execution of this image in the afternoon. Please be patient, I won't dissappoint.***



12/14/2011******************************************
After reading Faestock's contest rules, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Usually you could brainstorm, throw some ideas around... NAH! I went straight in.

The rules began by stating to work off a single stock image of Ms. Truscott, which was just her face with her signature red hair pulled back and her upper torso. A very natural, no makeup portrait... perfectly suited to play as a canvas.

I guess I don't mind telling you where I grabbed my other inspirations. I've been carrying Dissidia in my PSP for awhile now, playing as my favorites Cecil and Terra. Those were the FF's I grew up with. <3 So as the hero of the first real FF I owned and was introduced to, Cecil started out in the story as a Dark Knight. Go ahead and google his dark armor: spikes, plates, deep muscular cuts and the color scheme. I thought to merge that idea with that of a demon lady.
... Oh! I hope ya'll notice her eye too.

For the heavenly angel side, I just cleaned up what was already there. I used warm pink and skin tones to her face to warm up her skin. Something about "just an angel' felt empty. If I made her regal in a sense of a beautiful princess, I could get the mood right. But to stay away from the cartoon princess stereotypes: naive, wealthy with clothes that overtly convey her status, narcissistic, and so forth. So I went back to my video game background and recalled Zelda. If ever there was a fair and noble maiden worth journeying across the four corners to save from the palm of thieves and villains, AND THEN paint her portrait, hell yeah, it would be her. And Zelda's respectable qualities were the ones I wanted to transpose onto the angel.
... Hey, what's in that angel's earring?

The feathery angel's wing nearly brought me to my knees. "Download" for full view and inspect that deep arch at the top. Notice the little, teeny weeny "hairs?" Man, I nearly lost my mind.

I do hope ya'll like this painting. Tell your friends, tell your neighbors. More good stuff to come.

12/17/2011 EDIT************************************

Holy Crap! I made it into the final round of ten!
Here we go now. If you wanna support your friendly neighborhood artist in black, you can join the vote here: [link]

Take care, spike your hair! Woo woo woo! XD