Being 2 days away from driving to croatia I did not want to further work on the animatics. I feel that I will need quite a time in a stress free environment – not exactly the case now where you have to organize endless minor things to survive your vacation 
Having unexpectedly some hours available today, I decided to start with some Ara sketches as long as I have a tablet available.
I came to recognize that sketching a dragon or landscapes is somehow easier than doing character design on human like beings. I know exactly what traits Ara should have and what she should signal through her appearance but to bring this to paper is very hard for me – i just lack the knowledge and experience.
So I struggle along and try and erase and draw and erase ….
Anyway I am slowly arriving at something which starts to resemble the Ara I have in my mind.
Therefore before leaving I post the current state of my Ara designs.
The first image above is the basic design I was able to create so far.
Here are some crude shading tests and I played a little with a small type of crown.
And here is the result of me doing some hair shading – this was actually real fun. It departs somehow from my original idea ( she looks too old for my taste) but I decided to put it here just for the fun of it .
What amazed me without end was how small changes to the nose or chin changed the whole character of Ara. With just 2 lines differently drawn she was one time 8 and the other time she looked like 20. To be able to consciously do this must be a real adventure.
