Last updated on June 15th, 2025 at 12:45 am
I’ve been having some recent online success (mostly on Tumblr and X) with my Avatar Aang fanart and thought I would share my artwork process. This blog wasn’t planned so I am missing the in-betweens during my process, but I did pull out what I could.
The last time I drew Aang was in 2015, when I drew him on the front page of my new art book. Ten years later, I’ve wanted to draw him again, now as an improved artist. I had a pretty good idea what I wanted before starting. I wanted Aang to be sitting on a field of fresh green grass with a happy and calming look.
Quick sketches were done in my art book. Unsure of what colours to use: watercolour drafts helped me determine that the scene would bring out more emotions with strong natural lighting from the sun and under a blue sky. I used an existing artwork by another artist for his pose as reference. Things started to head south because the reference anatomy was incorrect and I couldn’t find a way to make it work on Aang. Furthermore I had trouble with his face and expression. Everything combined made this a poor artwork.
I knew things weren’t going to get better and wanted to fix things fast. I took a days break and took the time to reflect on my mess. I realised the general pose misaligned with the initial peaceful idea and I was using too many references, which is just as bad as using too little.
After seeking out new ideas, I went for a pose of Aang meditating. The original name for the piece was “Tranquillity” but changed to “Inner Peace” once I made the pose change. Things were going well and I didn’t have too many problems after this. I continued with the bright saturated colours from before to give it it’s punch.
As always, I try to learn something from my mistakes. This time it was definitely the overuse of references, when muddled together caused a lot of confusion for me.
Thanks to everyone for their love and support for a small artist like me. I have done some other Avatar fanart, so please go check them out too!
