I thought I wanted to draw dragon heads that looked more like snakes, with their smooth elegance, vs all the gnarled knobs of an exaggerated crocodile, piled with horns and goat ears. But after seeing this piece, I've begun to think that maybe I shouldn't aspire to draw snake-like dragon heads. ;_;
This giant snake drawing has a head shape that just does not portray elegance, strength, or even majesty. And yet, it is unmistakably snake-like in its head shape, even without looking at the body.
Then again, I know that photographs of real snakes have all the qualities I want to convey, and there's no reason that someone else's drawn interpretation of snakes is anything more than their interpretation. For all I know, this artist probably meant to imply a dragon with suspicious and un-admirable qualities. In fact, now that I look at the girl in the drawing, she is looking at the giant snake with a kind of contempt, but totally unintimidated by it, as if it wasn't worth being frightened of. When I look at a real snake, I don't see that, and I don't have to draw that. Snakes are not automatically narrowed into this one artist's interpretation. My interpretation can be what I want it to be.
UPDATE: 2:53 PM 3/24/2014
Just discovered the Indonesian Autumn Adder. So freakin' adorable, I can barely stand it!
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| http://holmesyde.tumblr.com/post/80457655926/indonesian-autumn-adder-baby-smaug |
OuO! Adorableness of a snake; stylish scales of a dragon! Must find more photos of Indonesian Autumn Adder and sketch! *u*!
That’ll solve the self-doubt I recently had about wanting to draw dragons with snake-shaped heads. This makes me so happy, because I was starting to feel really sad at the idea of not using snake references for my dragon heads (as if that'd be _another_ drawing style I'd fail at).
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