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The Dark Wanderer…


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EDIT: This drawing got 1st place in the contest
Thank you!
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This drawing is entirely done with traditional pencils…

This is my entry for the Own Character Contest of club
As soon as I read that there was a contest for Own Characters I immediately thought about my main character from the book I’m writing at the moment. I thought it would be cool to draw this character and enter the contest. I worked SO SOOOO hard the past few weeks, I was afraid I wouldn’t make it before the deadline. I’m so happy I did lol xD. I spend every weekend on this single drawing. I didn’t even have time to do other stuff.
This is actually the first contest I enter, so wish me luck !


About the drawing…

Seriously, I’ve never worked so hard on a drawing before It nearly killed me
Well… not me… but my hand

It took in total 45 hours to finish. Mostly because it was so hard and it took ages to draw the things right on the paper. Everything you see is drawn without references, except for the bird. I used 2 references for this beautiful creature. 1 for the head and one for the legs and claws etc.
It was a real challenge every time I started at a new texture. Like the textures on the metal and his clothes and the feathers.
I designed his clothes in the way they were described in my book.


About the Characters…

The man’s name is Ayden. He is 26 years old and lives in the dark forest that lies around the village Eranon.
His best friend is this bird whose name is Aya. She is a female bird. Ayden wears this small silver flute around his neck. When he plays it, Aya will return to his hand.

Why does he live in the forest? Well…

Here is a part from my book ( I translated it quick and I skipped some parts, so my apologize if there’re any mistakes), The other main character Elyssa is talking to her father Gennaro:


_{‘Never!’ He yelled. ‘Our village is surrounded by this dark forrest. No way you will ever go there!’
‘But why father?’ She asked. Tears were falling from her eyes.
He took a deep breath and took place in his chair.
‘This forest is very dangerous, dark and cold. It’s not the beautiful nature you think it is. Many people don’t take the risk to go through this area. Only the main roads are quite safe. A long time ago, when you were just a young girl, this horrible thing happened. The people from our village remember everything from that awful day. Many years passed, since the people have talked about that day. That one single day. It was a massacre. A hell! I will spare you the details, my child. The most important thing is that there was one man, a young man. The cause of all these evil things. After this incident we banned him from our village, forever. He walked away, overwhelmed with blood. Not from himself, but from his victims. Since that day he never returned…’
She looked up and shook her head a couple of times. ‘Why is it that I didn’t know about all of this?’
‘We never told you. You were to young. But now you’re older and since you want to go to the forest so badly I thought it would be wise to tell you this.
‘And what about this man? What is he? Is he still alive?’
‘What he is? The devil! Most of the villagers never ever saw him again, but that doesn’t mean he’s dead.’
‘But how do you know he’s still alive?’
‘He is, we just know… He lives in the forest, where? Nobody can tell. He lives from mother nature. Sometimes we find clues that he’s still alive. Not footprints…No... blood, feathers, humans pierced by arrows.’
‘Feathers?’ Elyssa asked.
‘Yes, feathers! You see, he carries this bird with him. They call him The bird of light. This bird has feathers which look like golden feathers in the sunlight. That’s why we gave him this name. No one ever succeeded in training this bird, making it tame. Till he came into the forest. He uses this bird to look out for new victims. Some people pretend that they have seen this bird flying above our village. People who ever visited this forest and saw this man, describe him as The Dark Wanderer. He has been seen on an enormous black horse. He wears a cape over his shoulders and head, so his face is unrecognizable. No one ever saw his face entirely.’
‘The Dark Wanderer…’ She repeated.
Gennaro nodded. ‘Yes, The Dark Wanderer!’}


That’s a part of the story ABOUT The Dark Wanderer, also known as Ayden.
Now you all think that Ayden is an evil person But he’s not.
The horrible incident that happened 10 years ago, happened actually a little bit different then Gennaro is telling. He tells Elyssa this story, so she wont go to the forest.

Guess what She IS going to the forest and meets Ayden. She don’t want to go back to Eranon, so she makes a deal with Ayden that he will bring her to her niece in the village Tàhrone. During this big journey she became to realize that Ayden is not the person her father was talking about.

And yes, they will fall in love in the end



Oh god, I think this is the biggest description I ever wrote lol

I’m so glad that this drawing is finished
I'm really happy with the result !
I think that this is the best OC I drew so far.

And I hope you guys and girls like it too.


Tools:
Used: 2H, HB, 6B pencils, 0,5 mm mechanical pencil, Tortillion for blending, kneaded eraser
Time: 45 hours
Size: A4
Paper: 200 g/m2 paper


Reference Pictures for the bird:
I used 2 reference pictures from !Insanistock


Dedications:
I dedicate this drawing to ~M-i-n-c-a, because she helped a lot in the progress of this drawing. Also she started to love my character Ayden and she has read the book as far as I finished it.
And I dedicate this drawing to ~Ayedail, He also helped me a lot with this drawing.
Thank you guys


Thanks for looking!
I hope you all like it.



If you want to make fanart of Ayden or Aya or if you want to color this drawing,
Please ask permission first!


Ayden and Aya are © to =D17rulez / Daisy van den Berg