Art Work: Leviathan

My rendition of the mythical sea beast Leviathan.

Every now and then I get bum out with work and being lost in the world of advertising and repetitive layouts...it's hard living in a society when you have to make a living out of what you're good at but the lack of passion to pursue. I mean, advertising is a fun field to be in, but the pressure and boxed-type clients can be frustrating at times. I miss the energy of doing art just for the heck of it...and the last time I checked, it's been months since I held a brush or drew something I liked for that matter.

After watching a documentary on History channel called Beasts of the Bible, I was struck with a sudden urge to draw something fantasy-related. Drawing fantasy is invigorating for me as it lets your imagination flow, not restricted by proper anatomy or even logic. I loved fantasy as long as I could remember, and I still do today as is evident in my choice of movies, videogames, and books. I've bought a lot of references in my interest to learn about mythology including a dictionary of angels and faeries, collection of fantasy creatures, and an encyclopedia about steampunk. I'm still looking into finding a good book about dragons since the one I have is 32-pages thin, as well as a complete bestiary reference.

My Steampunk Bible...I haven't gotten around to reading it yet.

So, the one I did is the sea-monster named Leviathan, mentioned in the Bible in the Book of Job. It is translated in Hebrew as "whale", but apparently a lot went on over the years and the simple term was lost in translation as now it is considered as a sea dragon or serpent with all sorts of descriptions. I was first introduced to the Leviathan as a GF (Guardian Force) in Final Fantasy VIII, and the creature stuck to my head since then.

I had four animal-inspirations for this piece; the entire anatomy is basically structured after an Asian dragon except the head which is more western in influence. The body color I got the inspiration from a tiger shark with its perfect camouflage in blue waters as the stripe effect blends in with rippled water when you look from above, and the bright color on its lower half to mimic the sunlight when you look from below. The head was in reference with a cobra's hood to make it look menacing because it's cool. The fourth and last animal I referenced it from is the stingray's tail as a barb stings out of its dorsal fin. When it extends it false-arm...it's actually a pectoral fin, it flattens out to look like a stingray. The tip of its barb excretes poison and can easily rip off flesh. It mostly feeds of big game fishes such as tunas, sailfishes, groupers, and even dolphins. The leviathan's size can reach over 60-feet at maturity, and can weigh for over a ton, and ages up to two-hundred years. That's all I know...or at least that's all I'm using to describe the creature that I drew. 

It was the first time, in a long time, that I used watercolor so it kinda looks sucky, besides, I did it all in one afternoon as I watched the show so my only consolation is that I got it done in one sitting and it isn't terrible. Its anatomy, I'm aware, does not qualify it as a viable sea creature with the lack of gills and the limitation I did with the anatomy of its head, but hey, I needed a mental break so doing this came with the lack of desire to make it a believable creature. After all, what is fantasy but an exaggerated impression of reality?

Tiger shark from fineartamerica.com