BigBang ARTPOST! For I Know What A Prince And Lover Ought To Be by anamuan

[beelikej]

When I picked the summary of this SPN_J2_Big Bang story I thought of fairytales* and in combination with the setting in medieval times it made me think of the gloriously illustrated books from that era.
I wanted to capture the point of view of the young boys in the first part of the story with children's drawings and I got out my pencilcase. So be aware for some old fashion illustrations by hand, even though I of course mostly messed around in Photoshop;). Now, without any further ado, may I present to you:



Title: I Know What A Prince And Lover Ought To Be
Author: anamuan
Artist: beelikej
Genre: RPS AU
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Set in a kind of medieval AU, Jensen and Jared are sons of rival kingdoms. They meet as children without realizing exactly who the other is and become friends as they search for 100 magic wishing pebbles so that "Jay" can wish for a puppy. Before they know if the wish can come true, they are fostered away.
Several years later, they meet again as Prince Jared and Prince Jensen and, after a lot of tension, fall back into old friendship and new love.

ARTWORK!
Map with all the kingdoms

anamuan asked if I could make a map to accompany the story and gave me lots of additional information to make sure I divided the land properly. (Thank you! :)

Storypages
Title page:


First page:

(Note: this introtext was part of one of the first drafts and is slightly altered by me for design purposes:)


Dividers
(Pebbles!:)






Will they collect enough to make the wish come true? Find out here!


Illustrations
Young Jensen and Jared:


Adult Jared and Jensen:



Wallpaper

800x600 | 1024x768 | 1280x1024

Icons
1. 2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8.


Thank yous
For this BigBang I tried to use as many of my own resources as possible. For the backgrounds I took a lot of photos and I added my own drawings. More information about all the images I used can be found in my BigBang Sourcepost.

Thank you anamuan, for providing inspiration with this epic story! I'm thrilled we finally get to share our creations with the rest of fandom:)
Once again BIG thanks to wendy and thehighwaywoman for the awesome organisation of the spn_j2_bigbang.

Comments are always loved, whether they are long or short, positive or negative. Talk to me!

J.

* (Even though I live in a country with a royal family and loads of shaggable charming heirs to the throne, princes still always sound like fairytales to me;)

Comments

[yasmine32068.livejournal.com]

WOW!!! This is so beautiful!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you:)

[kelleigh.livejournal.com]

Lovely work! The pages remind me of the openings to the older Disney animated movies, which immediately sets the right atmosphere for what (I imagine) this story will be. That, and I just love the wallpaper of Jared and Jensen as adults -- I'm such a sucker for royalty stories! Great job ♥

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you:) There is something about princes and princesses that speaks to the imagination, isn't there? :-)

[sillie]

Wheee! Awesome job! I love the additions of your own drawings. <3

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thanks:) I figured as long as I kept the drawing limited to a kid's level, I'd be alright *grins*

[auroraprimavera.livejournal.com]

I've been wanting to read the story, but your art totally cemented it for me. It's all so lovely and I think it's awesome that you used your own resources. :D

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Yay! Mission accomplished;) Thanks for your comment!

[somnolentblue]

These are lovely illustrations; I really like their texture and quality.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you! Seeing as the texture was something I struggled with, it's great to hear that it works:)

[innie_darling]

Very beautiful.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much:)

[xingti.livejournal.com]

Wow! Great work! I really like this fairytale style!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*beams* Thank you!

[tanisafan.livejournal.com]

Oh wow, dude, I especially like that first page. I wish all fic could look like a fairytale o_o. And it has a map! And a book cover! Urghhh.

Next year I'm finding a project JUST so I can beg you into doing my artwork.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'd be honoured if you begged me;) It would definitely be an extra challenge to try and please you *grins*

[bflyw.livejournal.com]

I love the style of the art. Very medieval. :-)
I especially like the map of all the kingdoms.

It has been great seeing your artwork for this BB! I was excited about you joining this year. I have seen some work by you before(Hair guide and birthday gifts etc....) but nothing as big as this. So I wasn't sure quite what to expect. You should continue doing more art for stories!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much:)

When I started BigBang I realized I had never actually published very elaborate artwork online and the prospect was a bit daunting. At work I never have the luxury of time, and it was overwhelming but very interesting to see where that led me. I still feel my work is too constricted by embedded rules about structure and 'neatness', but I've already learned so much working on all three BigBang projects, that I'm looking forward to challenging myself even more;)

[ala-tariel.livejournal.com]

Oh, these are really cute and beautiful! I love the map as well. :D:D:D:D

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you, I'm thrilled you love the map, since that's mostly my own drawing *proud*

[inanna-maat.livejournal.com]

oh my god!!!! such an amazing work!!! It´s so fantastic and nice...

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you for your enthused comment:)

[lattimore.livejournal.com]

Your art is so charming! I really enjoyed the way you blended the manips with hand-drawn illustrations, it looks very cute.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much. It makes me happy to know adding my silly little hand drawn pictures worked out alright:)

[aldehyde.livejournal.com]

very neat!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you:)

artwork

[(Anonymous)]

To see this artwork together makes it even more beautifull and I admire the precision and near it the right sphere.
Hugs and kisses from your mam.

Re: artwork

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thanks, mams, you know how much your comment means to me:) *knuffel*

[wendy.livejournal.com]

I LOVE the picture of Jared and Jensen as kids, really awesome. I also love the map and the pebble dividers, they really added to the story. The first page made to look like a book is so creative and such a cool idea!

You did an awesome job, thanks for your work on this!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I was thrilled to see the pebble dividers come out the way they did:)

*blushes from all the compliments*

[aubergineautumn.livejournal.com]

The map and collage/pictures were so wonderful! The map really helped set the reader get into a happy frame of mind, it's so cute!!!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much! I'm glad the map helped, I had fun making that:)

[schnute23.livejournal.com]

GREAT artwork, totally love it all ♥

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Ahw, thank you :-)

[writinginrain.livejournal.com]

Delightful illustrations. And I'm still giggling over the horse in 'The hunt.' 'The ceremony' is too cute for words! Thank you

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

:-) Thank you! The horse of course refers to a specific scene in the story, which makes me giggle thinking about it. Look at the guys' innocent faces. *grins*

[writinginrain.livejournal.com]

mmm, wonder what they might be thinking about... ;)

Perfect art!

[kruel_angel_lj]

Awesome job! Love the art!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much:)

[vodou-blue.livejournal.com]

I adore those storybook pages! Bravo!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Yay! Thank you:)

[hezio2.livejournal.com]

wow, this is impressive. It had to be a LOT of work. I love how you used the pics of them as kids. The "page" idea looks just like it was taken from a middle ages book. This makes me want to read the fic.;)
I hope I find more of your art around LJ.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you:) I was thrilled to have a lot of time to work on these. I'm glad to hear the bookpages feel authentic:) If you're into the middle ages this story is worth a try, since it's full of knights and old kingdoms!

(If you want to peek at more of my artwork, you could click this link to my BigBang and ReverseBang artwork ;-)

[sandymg.livejournal.com]

Just read the story and wanted to drop a note about how lovely your illustration are and how well they worked with the tale. Bravo!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Ahw, thank you. It's great to know people are still discovering and enjoying the story and artwork:)

[art3mis (from livejournal.com)]

Love all of it! Very in style. I like how you captured the tone of the story through your art and I especially love the cartoon dragon and the map of the various kingdoms. Could I ask what method you used to make the map?

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you:) I love that you feel it fits the story, as I wanted to do this very specific style right after I read the first draft and wasn't sure people would get it.

I know you already found my source post where I mention a little bit about my methods, but here's what I did step by step (sort of) to create the map:
- I drew the map with a gray pencil on white paper, scanned it and used a crayon brush in Photoshop to darken the lines and an aquarel brush to colour the kingdoms.
- I then put that drawing on top of an image of parchment and used some transparant filters to get the right colour and structure.
- I drew all the castles, trees and other details with coloured pencils on paper and then scanned, scaled and brightened them before pasting them in the map
- I had originally written the text by hand, but eventually decided to use a font for readability.
- The grass, compass and pebbles are photographs I made
- The 'flag' with the date in the upper right corner was made from an picture of a crest I found while researching knights;)

Hope that answers your question!